One of the things I like best about my job is being able to educate consumers and the media about grassfed meats and the people who commit their efforts to raising and producing them. Sometimes, though, it feels like I’m up to my hips in feedlot manure, especially when it comes to terminology and labeling.

A couple of weeks ago I read an article written by a food writer who said she doesn’t feel that the term grassfed is accurate, so from now on she’s going to refer to grassfed meat as grass-finished. In her mind, that may be more clear, but in the real world, it’s totally incorrect and does her readers a disservice. And then I read about a James Beard Award-winning chef who referred to the meat he serves as “some grassfed and some ‘grassfed and grain-finished.’” WRONG!

I don’t think either of these people is ill-intentioned or trying to deceive anyone — they simply haven’t been educated about the correct terminology. And if people in the food industry don’t know, how confused must the general public be?

That’s why it’s vitally important for anyone who raises and sells grassfed products to use uniform terminology and to educate the customer. One reason people stop buying sustainably-raised food is that they get overwhelmed and confused by all of the different labels, and it’s just easier to give up and buy a dozen factory-raised white eggs and a Styrofoam tray of ground beef.  If we’re going to continue to grow into something more than a tiny niche market in the multi-billion dollar food industry, we all have to be sending the same message.

Below is a terminology primer. Feel free to copy it and add it to your website, pass it out to your customers at the farmers market, or incorporate it into your newsletter. (As always, please give AGA attribution.) If you or your processor, distributor, or customers have any questions, please don’t hesitate to  email us.  And if there’s any way we can help you spread the word, let us know. We’re here to support you.

A Meat Terminology Primer for Consumers

Initial findings offer good news for sustainable farmers, as well as the retailers and restaurants offering their products. Almost half of respondents reported including sustainable meat, dairy, and/or eggs in 1-5 meals each week.  The vast majority of respondents believe sustainable products are healthier (89.6%), more nutritious (80.8%), better tasting (80.7%), better for the environment (93.8%), and safer (86.3%) than conventionally raised animal products. Additionally, a majority of respondents stated that they would pay more for sustainably raised meat, dairy and eggs, but noted these products were difficult to find in chain grocery stores. As 60% of respondents reported shopping in these chain grocery stores, this could represent a marketing opportunity for sustainable farms.

AWA Program Director Andrew Gunther explained the evolution of the study: “We knew the demand was there. Proving it was another matter, and we are grateful to Dr. Carol Kline and her team, our partners on the study, for demonstrating the tremendous potential of this growing market and the importance of transparent labeling.” The study also revealed promising findings for farms engaged in agritourism. A majority of respondents reported a willingness to pay for a tour of a sustainable farm, and believed the visit would increase their loyalty to the farm brand.

The theme of transparency was a common thread throughout the study, and was most apparent in the overwhelming consumer demand for transparent labeling. Nearly all respondents said that clear labeling for animal products was very important to increasing the production and consumption of sustainably raised meats. Gunther concluded, “This study confirms what we have been advocating all along -informed consumers make sustainable choices.”

Read the full report at  http://www.animalwelfareapproved.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/2011-Animal-Products-Survey.pdf. 

Scientific studies and field trials have shown that  BovaZyme® creates microbial growth directly in the rumen, enabling the animal to absorb all available nutrients from the food source.  BovaZyme® has been shown to help prevent bloat issues, increase rate of gain, increase conception rates, decrease mortality, help animals to better handle transitioning stress of all sorts, improve milk production, improve manure consistency, and improve feed efficiency.

BovaZyme® is administered either as a free range mineral or in cooked tubs. The company also has products for swine, goats, and chickens.

“The Certification Committee has thoroughly vetted this product and found it to be in compliance with our standards. Our members can use it, knowing that it meets our certification criteria,” said Carrie Balkcom, AGA’s executive director.

For more information on this product or to learn if it has a part in your feeding program, contact Terry Sheffield at 704-995-5477 or terry@rjagproducts.com, or visit the RJ Ag Products web site.

To learn more about AGA’s standards regarding supplements, download a copy of the standards.

Bovazyme® is a registered trademark of York Ag Products, Inc.

Research led by Dr Franciska de Vries of Lancaster University, showed that in drought conditions soil under agricultural grasslands was able to continue doing its job of containing carbon rather than releasing it into the atmosphere. Soil under intensively managed wheat fields, however was not so efficient.

The grasslands in the study also retained their nutrients better under drought conditions, when compared with wheat fields. The grassland soils did their job better because the soil biota in them consisted mainly of fungi, and the small animals which eat fungi, whereas in the wheat field they were mainly bacteria and bacterial-eating animals. Less fungi died because of the drought, so they could continue performing their functions. [Read More]

Grass-fed meats are showing up everywhere—in grocery stores, at farmer’s markets, and on the menus of burger joints and fine dining restaurants. Why? Because, compared to grain-fed, the meat is healthier for people (it has a more nutritious fat profile and more vitamins and minerals), is healthier for the environment, and has a more delicious flavor profile. There’s also the issue of humane treatment: Grass-fed animals living on open pasture almost always enjoy a better life than their grain-fed counterparts who spend the last months of their lives confined to feedlots.

In the old days, you could pay a visit to the meat counter in your locally owned grocery store or butcher shop and ask the butcher anything you wanted to know about the meat you were considering for dinner that night—how to cook it, where the cut originated on the animal, and which of your neighboring farms raised the meat. Those days came to an end with the advent of chain grocery stores, commodity farming, and Styrofoam packaging. But that’s changing, especially in large urban centers. [READ MORE]

Under the MRBI, NRCS provides financial assistance to farmers in areas covered by MRBI projects who undertake conservation practices specified by a project’s sponsors.  Most of the NRCS funding is provided through NRCS conservation programs.

For the new MRBI projects, NRCS is providing financial assistance to farmers of up to $11.74 million in FY2012 funding under the Cooperative Conservation Partnership Initiative (CCPI) and $25 million in funding from the Wetlands Reserve Enhancement Program (WREP).  The CCPI, in turn, draws its funding from the three major working lands conservation programs – Environmental Quality Incentives Program, Conservation Stewardship Program, and Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program.

Additional information on the MRBI is available on the NRCS webpage for the Initiative.

[Read more]

McDowell County is now the home of the first community-administered, non-profit meat processing plant in the United States that is also USDA inspected. This new facility should also help small-scale meat growers expand their operations and get their products out to more consumers.

The Foothills Pilot Plant is open for fully-inspected poultry and rabbit processing as of this week. Located at 135 Ag Services Drive off of N.C. 226 South, the plant is a collaboration of state and local governments, small-scale meat producers and grant-making agencies. It is operated under joint authority of the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Aministration to provide “regional growers with the opportunity to market their meat products to a broader consumer base.”  [Read more]

No one is going to accuse the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of rushing to judgment.

In 1999, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) petitioned the FDA to stop the common practice of feeding perfectly healthy livestock antibiotics, not to cure disease, but merely to make them pack on weight more efficiently. Of particular concern to the organization were antibiotics used to treat disease in humans. That petition came 22 years after the FDA itself said that such “sub-therapeutic” use of penicillin- and tetracycline-containing products in animals should be halted because it had “not been shown safe.” Studies in the mid-1970s had proven that bacteria easily evolved resistance to the antibiotics, becoming resistant “superbugs.”

Last week, the FDA denied the petition, along with a similar one filed in 2005 by Environmental Defense. Given that the FDA allowed the first petition to gather dust for 12 years, and that each year some 70,000 Americans die from resistant infections, its reason for denial is feeble at best. Pointing out that in it was working “cooperatively” with agribusinesses and pharmaceutical companies to phase out sub-therapeutic use of drugs, the FDA said that banning the practice outright “could take many years and would impose significant resource demands on the agency.”  [Read More]

Some of the hot button issues on the agenda, including using artificial preservatives and genetically modified ingredients, would seem Orwellian to many longtime organic farmers and consumers. The forecasted dustup will be debated by a USDA panel, deeply divided between corporate agribusiness representatives and organic advocates.

Under the Bush and Obama administrations, the USDA Secretaries have been criticized for appointing a significant number of corporate representatives, whose primary interest appears to be loosening the federal organic standards, allegedly in pursuit of enhanced profits.

“We think this meeting may well decide the fate of organic food and agriculture in this country,” said Mark A. Kastel, Codirector of The Cornucopia Institute, which represents family-scale organic farmers and their consumer allies across the U.S.  [Read More]