£1m red-meat processing research project will benefit whole industry

A £1 MILLION research project involving high-tech equipment in meat processing plants should produce benefits for everyone in the red-meat food chain.

This was the claim made yesterday by Donald Biggar, chairman of Quality Meat Scotland (QMS), at the start of a three-year trial to see if meat quality can be identified by using a range of electronic equipment.

Biggar was speaking at the Scotbeef plant at Bridge of Allan where the Integrated Measurement of Eating Quality project will take place.

"There will be a major benefit for consumers if they able to buy a more consistent product with no bad experiences from buying poor-quality meat. Retailers will be able to sell with more confidence. Processors will be able to target their markets better if they have a more accurate analysis of the meat they are trading.

"Grassroots farmers will be able to adopt the best management systems to produce beef of a consistently high quality.

"This will be an extremely valuable tool and I hope it will bring an enormous boost to the industry."

The problem for the scientists lies in devising the series of tests on the meat as it goes down the processing line. They will use a number of machines such as video imaging and infra-red spectroscopes to pick up specific information such as pH, temperature, meat colour, carcase fat, eating and nutritional quality.

None of the technology is in itself new, but packaging it together to provide a comprehensive list of information without slowing down the throughput will prove a major challenge.

"Over the next three years during which the experimental work is taking place, there will be some 300,000 animals go through this plant," said Ian Galloway of Scotbeef. "The issue for the research team is to create something which can cope with 300,000 different carcasses."

Galloway himself was optimistic about the project saying that it could really put this country at the forefront of the red-meat industry. It would, he claimed, also benefit Scotland's red-meat export trade with buyers getting far more information on the quality of the meat they are buying.

"We in Scotland never say anything about what we are doing. The Australians are good talkers on what they do. They have some of this technology but this project will put us in a very good position."

Galloway's son, Robbie, was also upbeat, saying that it would provide them with far more information on the consistency of the meat they were selling and he was sure buyers would see that as a big plus.

The launch of the project, funded by both the Scottish Government and by Quality Meat Scotland, was attended by the Cabinet secretary for rural affairs, Richard Lochhead, who said it would make the Scottish red-meat industry "more resilient" in coping with the demands of the market place.

"Our red meat industry is one of Scotland's great assets," Lochhead said. "But competition on the domestic, European and world markets is fierce. We may be top of the table now but we cannot afford to stand still."