A particular focus of this thinking was on the quality of red meat products being supplied to consumers. Thea Laufs of food quality assurance company, LTL Consultants, together with Janusz Luterek, an attorney with Hahn & Hahn specialising in consumer legislation, told delegates that their implementing of the new ISO 22000 Certification was imperative towards testing the effectiveness of food safety systems in order to control and produce the best quality for consumers and to manage liability for quality.
ABSA Bank’s Head of AgriBusiness, Ernst Janovsky, also encouraged abattoirs to expand and refurbish with the latest technologies that would help ensure improved productivity and meat quality. Janovsky said that these capital acquisitions should be carried out before interest rates possibly began increasing later in the year as the rand remained weak, or weakened further.
Professor Eddie Webb, Head of the University of Pretoria’s Department of Animal and Wildlife Sciences, urged the red meat industry to implement all the measures needed to gauge all possible elements related to quality throughout the abattoir process. He also encouraged the industry to embrace new thinking on the influence of abattoir processes on meat quality.
