Ed Green Nuffield trip to usa and Canada, June/July 2012 Friday 22 June 2012
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- Greg Hanes, Assistant Vice President, International Marketing and Programs, and Dan Halestrom, Senior Vice President Marketing and Communications
- Michael Igoe
- Thursday 28 June 2012 JBS meat plant, Greeley, Colorado
- JBS Kuner Feedlot, Greeley, Colorado
- Friday 29 June 2012 Colorado State University, Fort Collins (see www.beefresearch.org
- Dr Terry Engel
- Dr John Sofas
- Saturday 30 June 2012 Temple Grandin
- CANADA Sunday 1 July 2012 Neil and Barbara Dennis, Sunnybrae, Saskatchewan
- Tuesday 3 July 2012
USMEF, Denver Meetings at the world HQ in Denver of the United States Meat Export Federation (USMEF). Met John Hinners, Assistant Vice President of Industry Relations, who gave run down of its structure. USMEF is a vertically integrated trade association. Mission is to increase value and profitability and enhance demand with a presence in 100 countries (John Brookbank in Brussels). Non profit making since its inception in 1976. Half of funding comes from the government, the other half from around 200 members, who include packers, producers, grain producers, soy bean producers. Market development in 80 countries which focuses on marketing, trade servicing and market access. Carcase utilisation - maximise cuts, offal sales and chef competitions. Trade Support - trade shows. Education and Buyer Loyalty - prime, choice, select. Retail Promotions - worldwide. Product Image and Market Access - send out positive messages. For every $1bn of beef sold, 12,700 jobs are created. Five year plan to double beef exports. Factors driving growth - rising income, growing middle class, changes in diet, declining self sufficiency In leading import markets, increasing market access, USMEF initiatives. Mexico - round, chucks, clods, offal. Egypt - livers. Russia - liver, heart, kidney. China - short plate and rib, tripe, intestine. Japan, S Korea - thin sliced beef, skirt, fingers, short plate, chuck, round, offal. Promoting iPhone recipe apps. Hilton Hotels in UK - specialty Creekstone burgers. Zandbergen - largest importer of US meat in Holland. "Grain fed" is an important selling point. Next met Greg Hanes, Assistant Vice President, International Marketing and Programs, and Dan Halestrom, Senior Vice President Marketing and Communications. US cattle numbers down. Biggest export growth in China. Trade deal allows 20,000 tons (and up to 48,000) of hormone free US beef into EU at 0% duty. Trade back the other way includes possible veal exports from the EU to the UK, but not yet confirmed and demand very regional in the east coast. Costco, US owned wholesaler, has presence in UK. In UK, Cheaper cuts of US exported pork in current economic climate sell over and above more expensive Welfare UK pork. Choice is $20 per hundredweight more than select in bulk purchases. Walmart up scaling gradually. Ecoli - ground beef is the big risk due to volume and mixing of batches, with huge recall cost implications. Most US beef exporters are small, niche operators, except for one big meat packer who is the exception. Australia - due to price of grain, feedlots are in decline with biggest only at 30% capacity. Japan big growth area for US exporters, with age limit now lifted form 20 to 30 months (BSE), and hope to displace Australia in this market. Australia has however taken up the slack left by the pink slime debacle (Lean Finely Textured Beef LFTB), providing lean product to mix with fat. Hamburgers are mostly 80% lean. Beef in the US is still some of the cheapest beef in the world due to the high price countries like Japan are prepared to pay. The US also has the huge advantage over other exporters in having its own massive domestic market to fall back on, so can sell specific cuts in boxes rather than whole sides. Next toured round retail outlets with Michael Igoe, an expat Irishman who edits USMEF Internet material (see photos). Said to watch the AMIs Janet Riley on the Steven Colbert Rapport tv show on YouTube. Wholefoods stores are extremely well presented with aesthetically pleasing tasteful lighting and fruit and vegetables presented on wooden crates in a blaze of colour as consumers enter the store. Meat is sold with a colour coded “5-step animal welfare rating program”: GREEN 5+: Animal centred, entire life on same farm GREEN 5: Animal centred, no physical alterations GREEN 4: Pasture centred YELLOW 3: Enhanced outdoor access AMBER 2: Enriched environment AMBER 1: No cages, no crates, no crowding RED Not step rated: does not meet requirements Tony's Deli - upmarket local store Wholefoods - upmarket supermarket (Waitrose) Safeway - midway supermarket (Sainsbury) Kings Sooper - lower end supermarket (Tesco) Walmart - big shed with cheap food (no equivalent) The Walmart store in the photo above, only had the mobile meat counter in this store every third Saturday. The same went for all the Walmart stores. This was the only fresh meat on offer in the entire store! Thursday 28 June 2012 JBS meat plant, Greeley, Colorado Built in 1962, this huge meat plant employs 3300 employees, slaughtering 5400 per day (1.8 million kg) over two shifts at 6am and 3.15pm. The lairage can hold 1,800 cattle. Cattle are drawn from all over the US. The line speed is 375 head per hour. Average liveweight of cattle is 580kg. Four FSIS vets on site, and 23 FSIS inspectors. 36,000 boxes of beef produced every day. VIA cameras record fat and confirmation levels. A marbling camera measures the rib-eye size and marbling where the carcass is cut half way down. The carcass is weighed as it exits the chiller after a 36-48 hour period, and goes onto the cutting floor. Cattle are bought either on farm as a truck weight, or as hot deadweight in the meat plant. This is audited by a producer organisation called Packers and Stockyards (P&S), who also check the trim if a problem arises. Truck load batches of cattle stay together, with carcass sort into Choice or Select occurring as they enter the chiller. Daily price changes are based on the USDA graded weighted average as shown on the USDA website. As cattle unload into the lairage, microphage sprays containing bacteria seeking bugs are sprayed on the coats of the cattle in the unloading shuts. These bugs stick to the cell wall of bacteria and kill them, but are only used seasonally when hides are dirty in winter. When hides are dirty, the hair is clipped post stunning along the incision line along the belly. “Pattern areas” where the knife cuts, are all sparyed with beef exide, which is a 65% lactic acid, 35% citric acid mix. Steam vacuum cleaners also suck down through the pattern lines. Once the hooves are cut off, hock suckers give the stumps a hot vacuum wash at plus 180 degrees F. Waste water is treated and discharged into rivers. A pre-efficeration (pre-gutting) cabinet also gives the carcass, and the head and tongue, another 180 degrees F hot wash. The gut contents are then processed, followed by the carcass split. Offal is sent straight off the slaughter floor for processing down chutes treated with exide spray. A final inspection is given to the carcass before the carcass travels through a full pasteurisation cabinet at 180 degrees F for ten seconds to kill ecoli bacteria. Electrical stimulation is then discharged to the carcass to aid tenderness, before another beef exide wash as the carcass leaves the slaughter floor. The line travel time to the chiller from this point is 15-18 minutes so two more spray cabinet washes are given as every 20 minutes one log growth of bacteria can develop. After 36-48 hours in the chiller, the carcass is graded, then sent to the cutting floor for boning. Primals and sub-primals are treated with “inspexx” organic acid spray before being boxed and distributed. Pre-ground beef trimmings are core tested for ecoli 0157:H7 and also for the other “Big 6” ecoli strains. At JBS, there have been only two recalls in 30 years. Pallets carry one large box of mixed batch beef trimmings. The distribution area was highly mechanised with an impressive conveyor and stacking system before pallets left for truck loading. A highly impressive plant, but characterised by heat and moisture, in comparison to the dry, cold meat plants in the UK. Formed in Brazil by Jose Batista Sobrinho, JBS is now the world’s largest multi-protein company with 124,361 employees worldwide, operating in 23 countries.Overall production is: 89,790 head of beef per day 48,500 head of pork per day 7.2 million poultry birds per day 148,500 metre squared of leather per day 1,266 tons of dairy per day JBS Kuner Feedlot, Greeley, Colorado This 98,000 head capacity feedlot on a 550 acre site underwent a million dollar overhaul in 2010 that has seen the implementation of a waste water processing lake, resurfacing and sloping of dirt yards to improve drainage and a upgrading of the steam flaking feed mill. JBS own the feedlot, whilst the Batista family own the cattle. The feedmill processes 2.8 million lbs of food per day, including 30,000 bushels of grain maize per day. Cattle on arrival start on hay, with the full ration introduced gradually. The full ration consists of steam flaked grain maize, dried ethanol distiller grain (from Nebraska), forage maize (from 4200 acres in a 20 mile radius), tallow, corn oil, finisher meal and rumensin. Tylan antibiotic is administered for the liver and kidneys. MGA is administered to stop heifers cycling. Zilmax beta agonist is administered as a growth promoter. The feedlot has 460 acres of its own farmland to grow feed. Five 28,000 lb feed trucks distribute the feed into concrete feed troughs. Two 60,000 ton pits store the maize, with another 110,000 tons purchased in. JBS have two Ph.D nutritionists on a staff of 750 across their eleven feedyards. The Continued Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO) utilises the cleaned water for drinking, dust control and for use in steam flaking the grain maize. Computer controlled water sprinklers help manage dust control. Surface water rights mean for every one gallon used, the feedlot has to account for the waste water. A catchment lake has a 300% storm water runoff capacity. In 2011, 40 million litres of runoff water were reused. In Colorado, water rights are becoming harder to come by, although it does have a good ground water system. Temperatures reach 110 degrees F in summer, and sink to minus 20 degrees F in winter. USDA take lab samples from the fodder crops to measure nitrate levels after irrigating run-off water onto crop land. 400 water tanks are used in an overflow system that prevents freezing in winter. Two sand filters and a UV light chamber kill pathogens. Nine pen riders (six Mexicans, three US) use 30 horses to check the pens of 350 cattle per dirt yard and pull out any ill cattle to move to the hospital area. The mortality rate is 0.27%, which equates to six deaths per day. Pens are scraped clean between batches. 30% of the cattle at the Kuner feedlot are dedicated to a “natural” program under the brand “Aspen Ridge”. These cattle have to be 50% red or black Angus, with no dairy or Braham influence. Trace audits are implemented back through to backgrounders and cow/calf producers. Kuner is the only JBS feedlot producing for Aspen Ridge, out of a total of eleven feedlots across six US states which range from 52,000 to 120,000 head in size. Temple Grandin designed the layout of the processing barn. On arrival, cattle are weight sorted. A “Temple Tagger” gives each animal its own lot number with the date of arrival, the buyer, the city/state source code and contract type (spot/contract). 1800 cattle can be processed per day. On leaving the processing barn, cattle are drafted into one of seven chutes and put on hay and water. 8000 arrive each week at 300-350kg, and 8000 are slaughtered each week at 650kg after 150 days of feeding. Custom fed cattle are charged 30 cents per head per day. There are many 10,000, 20,000 and 40,000 head cattle feedlots across the central US states. Some JBS facts and figures: One farmer in the US feeds 129 people; in 1960 it was 25 people The carbon footprint of a pound of beef was 18% less in 2007 than 1997 A ton of manure contains more energy than a barrel of oil A feedyard produces about one ton of manure per head of capacity A feedyard steer drinks about 10 gallons of water and eats 30 pounds of feed per day Friday 29 June 2012 Colorado State University, Fort Collins (see www.beefresearch.org) Met with Dr Dale Woerner and discussed meat safety and quality issues. Meat flavour is the top issues in research currently and meat safety has been a USDA priority since the Jack In The Box disaster in 1993 when a child died from ecoli. Meat flavour has centred on grain feeding. Carcasses have been getting bigger due to better genetics and nutrition and the use of growth hormones. No signs of any human ill effects from the use of hormones, although the biggest criticism has been that females enter into puberty quicker. Hormones work best when animals have reached 80% of their mature weight. Hormones increase weight and give a good return on capital on that criteria, but reduce tenderness by 0.5kg of shear force and reduce marbling by 30-50 marbling units (which Dr Woerner didn't think was a problem!). (see marbling scale). Certain hormone brands more aggressive than others, and feedlots still governed by weight. Growth hormones (oestrogen) have a range of multiple effects on the "switches" that effect animal growth that “cloud the system”, whereas beta agonists “directly target precise switches”, are fed in feed and give a androgenic response (male characteristics). Beta agonists are a chemical compound that increase feed efficiency and give a weight gain in lean meat. Ractopamine is a type 1, hydrochloride, zilpaterol is a type 2 and is more aggressive. Beta agonists used in around 60% of cattle and have been approved for around 11 years. Growth hormones used in around 90% of cattle and been approved for around 30 years. Approval by Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Consumers don't associate hormone use with loss of tenderness, but do align it with health and well being issues. 70% say they want natural beef, but only 3% buy it. Natural can give “fishy, gamey or grassy taste”. Meat categorised into Prime, Choice and Select. Supermarkets sell Select and low end Choice. Food service sell Choice and Prime. Marbling categories - Select and low Choice (slight/small), Choice (modest/moderate), Prime (slightly & moderately abundant). Rancher Reserve is a Safeway brand processed through JBS and Cargill plants for the last ten years and guarantee tenderness. CSU doing tenderness work for Safeway and Safeway also do their own testing in meat plants at a cost of $10 per steak. Certain cuts tenderise more effectively with age. The tender stretch machine was developed by E and V Technologies in Germany. 160 days is ideal length of time in a feedlot for tenderness and efficiency. Irradiated beef is only 0.2% of sales. It is effective in reducing pathogens, but once the meat is sterile and outside of a pack it can be vulnerable to bacteria. Irradiation is most suited to ready meals. Cooking instructions on packs are mandatory. There is more consumer resistance than scientific resistance to the use of lactic acids, with the build up of bacterial resistance cited as the biggest criticism. The ESTEC testing of the Big 6 ecoli strains is now mandatory. Salmonella is more potent than ecoli, but less of a problem in beef. There is an increasing leanness of carcasses, with the use of more continental breeds and the cutting off of more fat. Nutritional work is being done by CSU on individual steaks. Individual cattle ID will probably become mandatory after a big disaster. RCalf are an extreme group (see website) who are against this. Land Grant Universities established in 1862 by Abraham Lincoln in every state for agricultural development to use "science to feed a growing population". Sound familiar? CSU has 30,000 students with 1500 in agriculture. Met with Dr Terry Engel who specialises in nutrition of the rumen. Sulphates in the drinking water in feedlots can cause polio and brain damage in the cattle. Distillers grains can have large variations in the amount of sulphates they contain. Omega 3 feed inputs can also provide a fishy taste to the meat. Grass fed cattle are high in poly unsaturated fats. Met with Dr John Sofas who specialises in food micro biology. Following the 1992 0157 ecoli outbreak in Jack In The Box, the HACCP system brought in regulatory changes, including a recall system, as the testing system then didn't work. Some grinders dropped out at this point. McDonalds, for instance, will dictate some of the HACCP requirements. There has been agreement between companies not to make food safety a competitive issue. Discussed the JBS Greeley plant, and he thought this was old, badly designed, had high numbers and too fast a slaughter line speed. Needs modernising by separating the clean and dirty areas and slowing down the slaughter line speed. In Australia, there are slower slaughter line speeds, overnight lairaging where detergent mists can work overnight to clean he cattle. Overall, speed is the most important. Swab testing one in 300 carcases is mandatory. Both JBS and USDA are swabbing, with USDA also looking for salmonella. HACCP demands zero tolerance on visible faeces. Dr Sofas considers lactic acid effective and safe. UK FSA would encourage use of lactic acid. If more than 5% of McDonalds consumers don't want something, they won't do it eg irradiated beef. If fat content in irradiated beef is more than 10%, an unpleasant odour is given off. Could be a case for it for the young and cancer sufferers. But, if meat is cooked properly it's fine anyway. Most people with issues over animal welfare and the environment are vegetarians anyway. Boils down to what consumers attitude to risk is. Saturday 30 June 2012 Temple Grandin Instead of using growth hormones, why not use the genetics of "God's hormones" by leaving bulls entire and gaining double muscle. Tenderness will decrease however, but it also decreases with growth promoters. Climate important for food safety issues. The hot climate in the US on top of the 180 degree F hot washes make the slaughterhouse hot. In the UK, the cooler outside temperature helps keep the internal slaughterhouse cooler too. CANADA Sunday 1 July 2012 Neil and Barbara Dennis, Sunnybrae, Saskatchewan "Our land is so flat, when my dog runs away, I can still see him for three days”. 800 custom fed beef cattle mob grazed in 4 acre blocks and moved 4 times a day. Custom feeding is on a live weight gain basis. The farm carries 65,900kg of beef per acre. This grazing method takes off 20% of the sward the first time around. The paddock is then rested for 50 days. The second graze in the paddock takes off 60% of the sward, and again the paddock is rested for 50 days. This recovery time is crucial. Alfalfa makes up around 30-50% of the sward. The initial height of the sward is around two feet. Neil argues this captures more sunlight and "solar power" in the summer, and makes more sugar available in the plant for the cattle. A Brics test is used regularly to measure sugar content. In the winter, the extra height of the sward is important for capturing moisture from snowfall. This is a low moisture and rainfall area. Round bale hay consisting of mature grasses with seed heads, are rolled out in the winter for feeding. The seeds deposited will add to the seedbank in the soil. Indeed, Neil refuses to spend money on reseeding, instead relying on the natural seedbank that exists in the soil. He says plants now appear that haven't been seen in fields for a generation, and all without buying expensive seed. That said, he does at times direct drill some alfalfa into the existing swards. A certain amount of the sward is trampled flat to the ground and this is desirable to help add matter to the soil. Weeds are a symptom of a problem, not a problem in its own right, and weeds can be hammered with high density stock grazing. Compaction is the time spent in an area, not the stocking density. Grazing too tight stops root growth. However, a "deep massage" from a tight graze in the spring can help stimulate the plants. The paddocks are electric fenced with metal wire linked to the power lines. The farm vehicles have been adapted so the person moving the fences can drive straight over the fences and also carry all the equipment with them. Solar gates can be programmed up to two weeks ahead, to become released to allow cattle through to the next paddock. A donkey is also used somewhat comically to toll cattle through to the next paddock. Once the donkey starts heading somewhere, all the cattle follow! A network of underground water pipes have been dug in so that a movable water trough can be connected to the system in any paddock. A flat bed truck is permanently attached to a large water trough and has been adapted to hydraulically lift up the trough to move it between paddocks. Temperatures can reach minus 40 degrees C in winter, so pipes are trenched eight feet deep and a well has been dug that contains a warm vacuum that prevents the whole pipe network from freezing. The height of the sward, Neil argues, also allows the grasses and legumes to out compete weeds. The trampling of the weeds by the cattle also stresses them to the point of extinction. It is also possible to train cattle to eat weeds, like thistles, by introducing thistles as a feed option in a controlled feeding situation, and then turning cattle onto thistle pastures where they will proceed to graze them out of the sward. Through Brics testing, Neil has found, subject to seasonal change, the plants with the highest sugar content are, in descending order; yellow clover, grass, alfalfa, sangfroin. Furthermore, sugars are lower in shorter, younger grasses. Neil also runs around 150 suckler cows which will winter outside. The custom fed stores are only around for the summer. Oil wellheads are common in this area. Tuesday 3 July 2012 Directory: includes includes -> Ncaa legislative Proposals (Created August 16, 2007) includes -> Razon social includes -> 1983 • First camera 1986-88 • Freelance assistant to several Toronto based photographers 1989-96 includes -> What are hemorrhoids? includes -> FY18-19 Artist in Residence guidelines includes -> Icf headquarters Contacts includes -> Doing Business with Federal Aviation Administration Introduction includes -> Original Data (sequenced) Scientific Name Common Name includes -> Windows ce. Net expert Feature Select Form Download 197.43 Kb. Share with your friends:
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