Pink Slime, it's what for dinner. : LC Research/Media Forum : Active Low-Carber Forums

#91 ^

Thu, Apr-05-12, 08:08

Demi

Choose Your Hard!

Posts: 26,916

Plan: Muscle Centric
Stats: 238/153/160 Female 5'10"

BF:
Progress: 109%

Location: UK

Quote:

From The Telegraph
London, UK
5 April, 2012

End of cheap burgers and pies as meat removal process banned by Europe

The price of beef burgers and pies is due to rise after a technique used in the UK to remove scraps of meat from animal bones was banned by the European Commission.

The UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA) said it had agreed to the moratorium but stressed there was no evidence of any risk to human health from eating cow and sheep meat produced from the low-pressure 'Desinewed Meat' (DSM) removal technique.

The FSA said a "very small part" of the UK's meat processing industry used the DSM technique to remove meat from animal bones, with the product closely resembling minced meat.

The FSA said the DSM process had been used in the UK since the mid 1990s, and local producers had reported that DSM meat was also exported by other EU countries such as Germany, Holland and Spain.

The agency said in a statement: "The FSA is clear that there is no evidence of any risk to human health from eating meat produced from the low-pressure DSM technique. There is no greater risk from eating this sort of produce than any other piece of meat or meat product. The EU Commission has informed us today they do not consider this to be an identified public health concern."

The agency said the European Commission had decided that DSM did not comply with EU single market legislation and had therefore required the UK to impose a moratorium on producing meat products from the bones of cows and sheep using DSM by the end of April.

The FSA added: "If the UK were not to comply with the Commission's ruling it would risk a ban on the export of UK meat products which would have a devastating impact on the UK food industry."

The DSM process can still be used to remove meat from poultry and pigs but must now be classed and specifically labelled as 'Mechanically Separated Meat' (MSM), and not simply as 'meat'.

The desinewed meat at the centre of the ban is made from the flesh left on bones after slaughtering.

Rather than throw the remnants of meat away, they are separate from the bone mechanically. It is done under low pressure, so that the mincemeat still has texture.

A different high-pressure technique is used to create a reconstituted, paste-like mechanically separated meat. This process has been banned in lamb and beef because it has been linked to diseases such as BSE. The EC has decided the two techniques are essentially the same.

The British Meat Processors Association (BMPA) condemned the EC's moratorium as a "criminal waste of a valuable product" which would have "enormous implications" for producers, food manufacturers and some consumers.

BMPA director Stephen Rossides said: "While acceding to the Commission's demands, the Government and we hold that current practice in the UK is lawful. This product is not MSM (mechanically separated meat). It is meat, and there are no food safety concerns in its usage.

"This is a criminal waste of a valuable product at a time of a shortage of proteins, and when we are being urged to reduce food wastage. Common sense has gone out of the window."

The BMPA said the requirement to label products as 'mechanically separated meat' would substantially reduce its usage and value, and there would be costs for disposing of unwanted product.

It added that food products would have to be reformulated and relabelled at additional cost, and warned that the price to consumers would increase "with a particularly unwelcome impact on less well-off households, since this product is widely used in value lines".

It estimated the total cost of related job losses and other impacts to be in the area of £200 million.

Mr Rossides added: "The market implications of having to bow down to the Commission are huge. We look to the UK Government to continue to defend the UK's legal interpretation and established practice. All this has happened at break-neck speed. The industry must be given more time to adjust to any change in requirements and market circumstances in a controlled and properly managed way in order to minimise market disruption and financial damage."

The Food and Drink Federation's (FDF) director of food safety and science Barbara Gallani said: "We would like to stress that this is a technical issue around the interpretation of the definition of mechanically separated meat. We do not agree with the Commission's interpretation as MSM and DSM are two very different products and research by Which? in 2011 confirmed that consumers clearly view DSM as distinct from MSM.

"Food manufacturers will continue to liaise with FSA officials to understand the impact of the Commission's request to revise the UK interpretation of the definition of MSM to include desinewed meat (DSM).

"FDF supports a pragmatic approach to the required changes, including a reasonable timeframe for the transition, to avoid disproportionate measures that could lead to meat being wasted, causing a significant impact on the environment and on the price and availability of meat raw material."

The FSA said products using meat extracted by the DSM process included sausages, pies, burgers and reformed poultry products like chicken shapes.

FSA chief executive Tim Smith told reporters that the move by the European Commission had been unexpectedly "quick" but he understood its desire to harmonise processes across member states.

He hoped that eventually it could be shown that the change was not necessary.

He said: "We've been through a lengthy process of communication with the Commission, during which time the Commission has tried to standardise and harmonise across all member states. What they've done today might appear a little quick, in asking us to impose the moratorium, but though the pace may be surprising, the outcome is not."

He said the harmonisation would come to affect every member state.

"We happen to have come up first. What they will now do, in my opinion, is say, 'this is what we've done in the UK, you need to follow suit, and we will be looking for how you characterise this meat in your country'."

Asked if he expected that to be a rapid process, he said: "Yes. We will be making a fuss if they don't."

He said there was no risk attached to the process.

"The science and evidence base needs to be developed to prove our point."

And asked if he hoped that the change could be overturned, he said: "I am confident that over time we will be able to marshal our arguments with the other member states to achieve that objective."

He said the move had come "unexpectedly".

"We talk to consumer bodies, science and evidence gatherers, we didn't see any compelling reason to do anything other than keep talking."

A Which? spokeswoman said: "Our research into consumer attitudes on the labelling of meat products found that while people thought desinewed meat (DSM) was distinct from mechanically separated meat (MSM), they also wanted to see it clearly identified in the list of ingredients.

"We believe there should be clear labelling of food to allow shoppers to make an informed choice."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodandd...-by-Europe.html

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#92 ^

Thu, Apr-05-12, 08:22

PilotGal

Registered Member

Posts: 36,355

Plan: KetoCarnivore
Stats: 206.6/178/160 Female 5'7

BF:awesome
Progress: 61%

Location: USA

yup.. this subject matter has caused meat processing plants in the states to file bankruptcy and lay off thousands of employees.

#93 ^

Fri, Apr-06-12, 00:27

Ron_Mocci

Senior Member

Posts: 373

Plan: AK
Stats: 155/147/145 Male 5'7 3/4"

BF:
Progress: 80%

Pilotgal ... it don't have to be that way , just saying think what a great dog food that would make ! Way better then the sh*t they are pumping to our pets

#94 ^

Fri, Apr-06-12, 00:48

Demi

Choose Your Hard!

Posts: 26,916

Plan: Muscle Centric
Stats: 238/153/160 Female 5'10"

BF:
Progress: 109%

Location: UK

Quote:

From BBC News
London, UK
6 April, 2012

Could "pink slime" be rebranded?

Three out of the four US factories making "lean beef trimmings" are to be shut down following a public outcry. Is "pink slime" - as critics call it - finished or could it be relaunched under a new name?

The look on shoppers' faces as Jamie Oliver sloshed ammonia into a bowl of what he calls "pink slime" said it all.

They were horrified. They appeared to have no idea that the burgers they had been buying all these years contained anything other than prime cuts of beef.

But here was a TV chef showing them, in a 2011 edition of his US show Jamie's Food Revolution, how their burgers are bulked out by meat that in previous decades would have been used for dog food, and is only made fit for human consumption by being treated with household bleach.

Job losses

The decision by major US supermarkets, fast food restaurants - and some public schools - to stop using food that contains Lean Finely Textured Beef, to give "pink slime" its official name, is a victory for Oliver and online campaigners who railed against it.

But the resulting loss of 850 meat processing jobs, at a time when America is suffering high unemployment, has angered many - and turned Jamie Oliver into a hate figure on some message boards.

He probably did more than anybody to bring "pink slime" to mainstream attention in the US, although the social media campaign to kill it off did not take off until last month, when ABC World News with Diane Sawyer ran an expose.

The US Department of Agriculture has now allowed schools to remove products containing "pink slime" from their cafeteria menus after Texan blogger Bettina Elias Siegel gathered more than 200,000 online signatures in nine days.

For the meat processing industry, it has been a bruising lesson in public relations and transparency in the age of social media.

Industry fight-back

It might also be the first example of a food ingredient being withdrawn not because of any safety fears, but because people have decided it sounds disgusting.

Industry chiefs are furious about what they see as a media-led smear campaign against a product that has been used in the US since the early 1990s and meets federal food safety standards.

Earlier this week, they launched a fight back - unveiling a new slogan "Dude, it's beef" and enlisting the help of Texas governor and former presidential candidate Rick Perry, who dutifully chowed down on a burger containing the stuff on a visit to a processing plant in South Sioux City, Nebraska.

To British eyes, this stunt contains echoes of Conservative government minister John Gummer feeding his young daughter a beefburger, in front of the TV news cameras, at the height of the "mad cow disease" controversy in 1990.

But unlike the BSE outbreak no-one is seriously suggesting "pink slime" is dangerous - or even that burgers containing it are significantly less tasty or nutritious than other beef products.

The industry has launched a website, beefisbeef.com, to emphasise this - although Gary Martin, president of brand-naming consultants Gary Martin Group, believes they are missing the point.

"Who cares whether it's 100% beef and who cares whether it's lacking bacteria, if it's something that you find disgusting?" he says.

Tragedy

He describes what has happened to the company driven out of business by the "pink slime" controversy as a tragedy.

But he says it was caused, in part, by the lack of a registered brand name for their main product.

"They didn't brand themselves so someone else did," he explains.

Lean beef trimmings have never marketed to the public as a product in their own right so it's doubtful the companies making them would have thought that they needed a brand name.

But, says Martin, if they had been thinking ahead, they might have called the product something consumer-friendly like "Pro-leana".

It might not have prevented the media backlash, but it might have helped them deal with it better, he argues.

Consumer anger

But, like most experts, he believes it is far too late to rebrand the product now, as it would be seen as a marketing "ploy", which would further inflame consumer anger.

"Pink slime" is, in any case, a far more powerful brand name than anything the industry could come up with.

"It is a powerful image. To try to replace that image with something else might be tough," says EJ Schultz, a food marketing writer with Advertising Age magazine.

He believes consumer anger has been driven by a lack of transparency.

"People are wondering 'why didn't I know about this before? Why wasn't this labelled?' People want everything labelled these days."

Jason Karpf, who teaches public relations and marketing, also believes the food industry has got a lot to learn about modern consumers.

He says: "The heightened nature of consumer awareness means that food manufacturers must look at every component of their end user product and imagine public reaction to it. Predict and prepare for public reaction."

The next 'pink slime'?

Meat processors have been adding beef scraps to burgers and other products since the 1970s to keep costs down - but they will now have to come with a replacement "that can withstand lay person scrutiny," says Mr Karpf.

"They are going to have to think about the product itself before they try to come up with a name, and a campaign, that - dare I say - the public will swallow."

He sees parallels with High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) - a substance added to food for more than 30 years, but which recent studies have linked to obesity.

The makers of HFCS, which is derived from a chemical process, rebranded it as "corn sugar" - but they are locked in a legal battle with the sugar industry over the use of the term.

"In decades past, High Fructose Corn Syrup was just an ingredient on the back label if people chose to read it" says Mr Karpf.

"It is under a spotlight. Lean Finely Textured Beef was something the public was unaware of until the great increase in media and social media gave it prominence."

But while HFCS may yet have a future, "pink slime" does not, he argues.

Others are not so sure. EJ Shultz believes food containing lean beef trimmings could, when properly labelled, become a low-cost alternative for cash-strapped beef lovers.

Branding consultant Denise Lee Yohn believes that for the companies involved, it might just be a case of waiting for the fuss to die down.

Social media is a powerful consumer advocacy tool but the groundswell of anger generated by it can also be short-lived, she argues.

"If they can wait it out, and let the hype die down, about six months from now no-one will think anything of it and they can come back with the product."

Pink slime

Lean Finely Textured Beef is made from fatty beef carcass off-cuts
It is heated and spun in a centrifuge to remove most of the fat
It is then exposed to ammonium hydroxide gas to kill bacteria such as E. coli and salmonella
It has been added to burgers and other beef products in the US since the early 1990s to keep costs down
The term "pink slime" was coined in 2002 by former US government scientist-turned whistleblower Gerald Zirnstein
It was found in 70% of ground beef in US stores
The US Department of Agriculture allowed schools to remove products containing "pink slime" after an online petition
Supermarkets and fast food outlets also joined in the boycott
The beef industry claims it would have to kill an extra 1.5 million cattle a year to make up the "pink slime" shortfall

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17615456