Use of the Tecpro Pork Quality Meter for assessing meat quality on the slaughterline

Conductivity measurements made with the Tecpro Pork Quality Meter at either 45 min or about 20 h post mortem on 224 pig cacassees which exhibited a wide range of raw meat quality were moderately correlated with initial pH (pH(45); r = 0.54 and 0.62) but less well correlated with reflectance (r = 0.32 and 0.37), drip loss (r = 0.34 and 0.47 and other objective measures of meat quality in the M. Longissimus dorsi. Measurements did not allow differentiation between normal and dark, firm, dry (DFD) meat but were of some value in identifying carcasses producing potentially pole, soft, exudative (PSE) meat. In the UK they would be more useful for monitoring meat quality in large groups or populations of pigs, than for categorising individual carcasses for grading on technological purposes.