Scotland to start beef grading project

Scotland is set to start a three-year project to develop new techniques to guarantee the eating quality of Scotch beef this week.

The GBP950,000- (US$1.4 million) initiative is being funded by the Scottish government and Quality Meat Scotland (QMS). The Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) is to lead the research work in developing an automatic or semi-automatic system for grading beef on the way it will eat.

Scotland lags behind other nations, including Australia and the US, in giving consumers eating quality guarantees on the beef they buy. Australia's star-based system has long been admired and rewards beef farmers on how the beef they produce will eat as opposed to the UK's regime which focuses solely on the meat yield on an individual carcass and the European classification grid system based on fat cover.

The Scottish project – known as the integrated measurement of eating quality – will focus on developing techniques to be used in abattoirs to give an immediate indication of likely eating quality before the beef is matured.

QMS said Scotland would be the first to benefit from the technology that could be used alongside systems already in meat plants.

Chairman Donald Biggar said the project was important to all parts of the supply chain from farmers to retailers. A complex range of factors determine the texture and taste of meat and this programme will carry out research to identify the best management systems on farm for producing good eating quality beef, he added.