Consumers have always wanted safe food. Because of concerns for beef safety and additional government regulation and loss of modern production tools, in 1980 cattlemen began investigating ways to ensure that their production practices were safe and would pass the scrutiny of the consumer.
In 1982, the United States Department of Agriculture — Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) began working with the beef industry in the United States to develop the Pre-harvest Beef Safety Production Program. Not wanting any additional governmental regulatory programs, the beef industry adopted the term Beef Quality Assurance (BQA). Involvement with BQA provides cattlemen an important key for avoiding additional government regulation. USDA-FSIS has commended the National BQA program, as there are currently 47 states which represent 90 percent of the United States’ beef production involved with their voluntary program. Regulating ourselves has proven very successful and will continue to allow the industry the flexibility needed to produce safe, wholesome food in an economical manor.
Between 1982 and 1985, three feedlots and USDA-FSIS evaluated production practices to assess residue risks. In 1985, after careful analysis and adjustment of production practices, these three feedlots were certified by the USDA-FSIS as Verified Production Control feedlots. What was learned during those three years now serves as the backbone for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association’s BQA program. Success of the effort is clear: violative chemical residues have almost disappeared in fed beef cattle and injection site lesions have been reduced by over 67 percent.
While the BQA program was developing, Minnesota-based Pillsbury was implementing a quality control program that used many of the same principles. Their program, Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HAACP) gained USDA acceptance and is presently the dominant outline for quality assurance programs in processed foods. Per USDA regulation, all packing plants have developed HACCP programs.
The concepts of the HACCP program are the same as those of BQA. It is a process of determining what could go wrong, planning to avoid it and documenting what you have done to correct the situation, with the additional step of validation. In the cattle business, we have documented and validated everything we have done for years because it is part of good business. USDA’s HACCP program includes food borne bacterial pathogen control, a problem that currently is not controllable at the farm or ranch level. Therefore, HACCP concepts are applied in the Quality Assurance Critical Management Points (QACMP) system at the production level within BQA management. While this system does not focus on pre-harvest bacterial food borne pathogen control, the system will provide experience with HACCP concepts. When pre-harvest bacterial pathogen control measures become available, and/or federal regulations mandate control measures, the QACMP system will provide a valuable experience to aid operations and/or provide Minnesota cattlemen with valuable information and feedback needed to work with federal regulators.
BQA Objectives
Once the program was established, objectives were set for BQA. They are as follows:
1.
Set production standards in your operation which meet or exceed
NCBA guidelines.
2.
Establish a record keeping system which will meet FDA/USDA/EPA
guidelines, validate management activities and fulfill the program goals.
3.
Provide technical assistance through University of Minnesota
Extension staff and Minnesota Beef Council staff.
Industry Quality Challenges
The importance of BQA can be seen when reviewing the top quality challenges of the latest NCBA Quality Audit. These quality issues include injection site lesions, excessive external fat, excessive seam fat, dark cutters, inconsistent size and reduction in live cattle prices.
The 1995 NBQA provides management practices for reducing beef’s quality problems. These include: eliminating excess external fat and eliminating genetic and management systems that decrease beef eating quality, such as flavor, tenderness and juiciness.
Good production practices can reduce, if not eliminate, the occurrence of these quality challenges. Administration of animal health products based on label direction, marketing cattle at an optimum end point, reducing stress in cattle handling and the elimination of extremes in size of breeding stock are some of the procedures which can assist in the elimination of quality defects and increase market value of beef cuts.
Injection site lesions cost the beef industry $188 million annually and individual producers $7.05 per head of fed cattle marketed based on the 1995 NCBA Quality Audit. In 1991, 21.6 percent of fed cattle marketed had injection site lesions with 14.2 percent of these lesions being fluid-filled. In 1999, this defect was down to 3.4 percent with 0.3 percent being fluid-filled.
This is a dramatic improvement in seven years in fed cattle; however, the results of the first non-fed audit in 1994 showed that the percent of injection site lesions in non-fed cattle was found to be 28.9 percent (7.5 percent fluid-filled) but, in the November 1997 audit, this number increased to 40.9 percent.
Excessive external fat cost producers $103.04 per
head of fed cattle marketed. Typically, this loss plus those mentioned above
are passed along to all cattle sold by our industry.