The University of New England is licenced by the Trust to deliver this module as part of its formal curriculum. Students from other Universities may also enrol.
Educational Institutions. other than the University of New England, wishing to utilise these resources as research and/or reference materials will be provided a copy of all the materials, including source documents in Microsoft Word format, subject to their acceptance of a licencing contract with the Australian Wool Education Trust. This contract spells out their obligations to AWET and the limitations in the use of the materials. Such institutions must have an appropriate licence with the Copyright Agency Ltd.
Institutions or individuals who wish to utilise the materials as references or for self education will be provided access to the source documentation in PDF format only, subject to their acceptance of the terms and conditions. They can request modules and/or topics. If they have a CAL licence then the materials are provided free of charge.
Any questions or requests for additional information should be directed to: sheep.education@woolwise.com
This topic provides a definition of ‘meat’ and background information on the history of the production, consumption and trade in meat.
On completion of this topic you should be able to:
Consumption of the various types of meat varies from country to country, and changes with time. Most of the world’s meat is consumed in the country of origin and only a small proportion is traded on international markets. This topic provides background information on current world meat consumption and trade, markets for Australian meat and some of the characteristics of the Australian meat industry.
On completion of this topic you should be able to:
Most of the “edible” protein of an animal is present in muscle, of which there are three distinct types – skeletal, smooth and cardiac muscle. Economically, skeletal muscle is by far the most important due to the quantity present, and will therefore be the major focus of this topic.
This topic provides an introductory understanding of the structure of skeletal muscles in terms of the factors that affect the quality of meat obtained from them. The biochemistry of muscular contraction is also introduced.
By the end of this topic you should know:
The aim of this topic is to provide a basic understanding of the structure and role of connective tissue, particularly in terms of its association with the muscular system.
By the end you should know:
The aim of this topic is to examine the characteristic structural and metabolic differences of various muscle groups, and how this influences the quality of meat obtained from them.
By the end of this lecture you should know:
Topic 6: Early Post-Mortem Biochemical Events
This topic provides an understanding of the biochemical events that occur in muscle early post-mortem and their significance on subsequent meat quality.
By the end of this chapter you should:
The objective of this topic is to describe the effect of breed and sex on growth curves, mature composition and the maturing patterns of body tissues. Attention is also given to nutritional and growth path effects on the changes in body composition.
By the end you should:
The objective of this topic is to describe the pattern of growth and development of the musculature in the carcase. The scope for manipulation of muscle distribution patterns by genetic and nutritional means is also examined.
By the end you should:
This topic examines the pattern of fat deposition in the body of animals and the scope for manipulation by either management or genetic means.
By the end you should:
This topic examines the biochemical pathways by which fat is digested, absorbed and deposited in both ruminants and monogastrics and the scope for manipulation by either management or genetic means.
At the end you will:
Abattoir slaughter and dressing procedures have evolved from early practices which were relatively slow, unpleasant and unhygienic by to-days standards, which are efficient, clean and hygienic components of the meat supply chain. This topic provides an overview and basic understanding of what happens pre-slaughter and on the slaughter floor of an abattoir—stunning, exsanguination (bleeding) and carcase dressing procedures. The criteria for humane slaughter and ritual slaughter are also outlined.
By the end you should be able to:
The meat industry uses refrigeration for food preservation. In many countries, animals slaughtered for meat were, and in some cases still are, immediately distributed, sold and consumed. Preservation was therefore unnecessary. As producers began to produce surplus meat, however, preservation methods were required so that excess product could be held and used at a later time, or in a distant location. Chilling meat was an early form of preservation that could be used without changing the form or state of the products. Freezing meat was a logical progression from chilling that gave longer preservation times
At the end of this topic you should be able to:
This lecture examines a range of subjective and objective carcase measurements and their relationship to carcase composition and meat quality.
By the end of this section you should be able to:
The assessment of meat quality can be done subjectively by humans using their senses (sensory measurement) or by machines. There are advantages and disadvantages of both approaches. This lecture presents the various methods used for sensory assessment of meat quality, and how they are applied.
At the end of this topic you will be able to:
Whilst humans are the final arbiters of eating quality, there are a number of drawbacks to their use (eg, cost, time, variability). Over the years a number of mechanical devices have been developed for the objective measurement of tenderness. They are consistent, relatively cheap, repeatable, reliable, and not influenced by human bias, preference or by external irrelevancies. This lecture will cover their usage and how well they correlate to sensory assessment.
At the end you will be able to:
Reproductive technologies such as AI and MOET can be used to greatly increase fecundity. This increases selection intensity and, in turn, genetic gains
On completion of this topic you should:
Marbling is a term used to describe the appearance of intramuscular fat between the muscle fibres in meat. This topic describes the development of marbling, the genetic and environmental effects on its level in the muscles and its impact on palatability.
By the end you should be able to:
Tenderness is the most important determinant of consumer acceptability of meat, especially beef. This has led to the development of the World-leading grading system, Meat Standards Australia. However, once meat is tender, the primary determinant of acceptability is flavour.
At the end of this topic you should be able to:
The objective of this topic is to understand the importance of the production factors, including breed, HGPs and growth path on meat quality.
By the end you should understand:
This topic describes the practical on-farm quality assurance measures that producers should consider to minimise the risk of the customer being dissatisfied with the sheepmeat product supplied.
At the conclusion of this unit , students should:
The pre-slaughter period consists of the period of time from when animals are organised into a consignment, on the property where they have been “finished”, to the time when they are slaughtered at an abattoir. This period consists of a number of phases which will be discussed below and can be a critical period affecting carcase yields and ultimate meat quality.
At the end of this topic you should be able to:
Electric stunning is used in most Australian sheep-processing plants.
At the end of this topic you should be able to:
The period immediately following slaughter can have a dramatic effect on meat quality. Consequently, considerable effort has been expended in the development of specifications and control measures that can be reliably used in the abattoir to ensure that eating quality, particularly tenderness is maximised. The focus has centred on minimising the degree of myofibrillar shortening and optimising the degree of proteolysis.
This topic discusses the application of pre-rigor stretching of muscles to minimise myofibrillar shortening.
By the end you should be able to:
Meat is a highly perishable food. The meat industry in its current form would not exist if methods of preserving meat during transport and distribution had not been developed. In the early days of the meat industry in Australia, cattle were grown for their tallow and hides and sheep were grown for wool. Most of the meat was discarded because there was no way of getting it to overseas markets in an acceptable condition.
At the end of this topic you should be able to:
Cooking impacts on the tenderness, flavour and juiciness of meat. Changes in meat tenderness with cooking occur from alterations in both the connective tissue and myofibre proteins in the meat. The application of heat solubilises collagen which increases tenderness, whereas heat denatures the myofibre protein and this results in toughness. Therefore the resultant tenderness of meat depends upon the relative contribution of both the connective tissue and myofibre components and their interaction with time and temperature of the cooking process.
This topic describes the physical and chemical changes which occur in the cooking of meat.
At the end you should:
Japan, the United States and Korea all have grading systems based on yield and quality grade, as assigned by end point assessment of the carcase. This differs from Meat Standards Australia (MSA), Australia’s new domestic grading scheme, which is covered in a separate topic.
The objective of this topic is to outline the main features of the grading systems of our major trading partners, Japan, United States and Korea. At the end you will be able to:
The objective of this topic is to describe the consumer testing system and how it has been used to set grade standards. In addition the development of the pathways carcase grading scheme is described.
By the end you should understand:
This topic describes the development of the cuts based grading scheme. The cuts-based-grading model is described and examples are given of the magnitude of the various production, processing and value adding inputs on the palatability of beef using the cuts based model. In addition the potential benefits of a cuts-based grading system to the various sectors of the industry are discussed.
By the end you should:
Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA) has as its mission “World Leadership for the Australian Red Meat Industry” and MLA’s vision for the sheepmeat eating quality (SMEQ) research program is to deliver on this promise for lamb and other sheepmeats. MLA and the Sheepmeat Council of Australia (SCA) have undertaken research and development into defining and improving lamb and sheepmeat eating quality.
On completion of this topic you should be able to understand the importance of SMEQ to sheep meat production.
The term or phrase “meat inspection” refers to a set of standards or rules used for producing meat for consumption by Man and animals. On completion of this topic you will understand and appreciate the general philosophy for the practice of meat inspection (Veterinary Public Health) at meat export abattoirs
The use of wild animals as a source of protein for human ancestors has been identified as long as 5 million years ago. The appearance of Homo sapiens around 250,000 years ago ushered in an era in which animals were hunted for sources of both meat for food and skins for clothing.
On completion of this topic you should have an understanding of:
Just as the quality attributes of the meat game species offer is important, so too is the health and disease risk and status of these species. Potential disease risks should always be taken into account when developing new and exotic meats for human consumption; this will become apparent in this topic.
On completion of you should have an understanding of:
Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) is a systematic approach to the control of potential hazards in food industry operations. It aims to identify problems before they occur and establish measures for their control at the stages in production that are critical to ensuring safety or quality. Control is proactive because remedial action is taken in advance. Many QA processes are HACCP based. Such processes are a key to attaining good manufacturing practices.
This topic covers the basis of a HACCP system for controlling potential hazards in the food industry.