Some recent advances and future priorities in research for the meat industry

The meat industry is undergoing a period of very mixed fortunes with beef in particular losing market share; however, longer term forecasts are good for all meat species with demand growth coming mainly from developing countries. This review deals in particular with the main problems that are responsible for the decline of beef as a consumer product in developed markets. These are the meat safety crisis and the unreliability of meat eating quality, especially tenderness. The review suggests that recent research has defined and clarified these problems but they have not been elucidated to the extent that is needed for product assurance. Hence, meat safety and consistent quality are two of the core issues to be addressed in future research. The third core issue is product development which is very active in the most competitive sectors of the food industry and is weak in the red meat sector.