EDMONTON – A special type of photography will help Alberta beef producers know if their beef hanging on the rail is tender or tough.Chris Calkins, president of Goldfinch Canada, said the technology will be tested at Cargill’s High River plant by fall. He hopes it will become part of the regular meat inspection process.“We have become convinced we have the technology capable of classifying carcasses if it was going to be tender or not,” Calkins told a conference organized by the Alberta Livestock and Meat Agency.“We are at the cusp of taking a picture and telling if it is tender beef.”ALMA, the provincial livestock funding agency, has given Goldfinch more than $700,000 to fund development and get the product ready for market.In customer surveys, one of consumers’ biggest complaints is that they never know if the steak or roast will be tough or tender.“Tenderness was the number one fact on their decision to buy,” Calkins said.“Consumers want tender beef and are willing to pay for it.”Using a hyper spectral imaging system, the camera takes a picture of the rib-eye and determines whether it will be tough or tender using key points.If the rib-eye is tender, 20 to 25 percent of the rest of the carcass will also be tender.Calkins said the technology is about 98 percent accurate when the results are compared to traditional tenderness tests.Researchers are working on making the camera more portable and capable of working at the same speed as packing plant kill lines.They are also looking for ways to distribute the tenderness information through the food chain.“We need to strengthen our supply chain if producers are going to be rewarded for supplying tender beef. They need to know how to do that.”The goal is to make the technology available to packing plants and processors, he said.The technology may help put the brakes on lowering beef demand.Calkins conceded verifying tenderness for one cut doesn’t mean the entire carcass will be tender.“A round steak is a round steak and not likely to be tender.”
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