Meatpacking Industry

I

Introduction

Meatpacking Industry, large industry involving the slaughtering, processing, and distribution of cattle, sheep, and hogs. It is one of the most important industries in the United States and has its primary concentration in the Midwest. The packing industry has tended to decentralize in recent years, and slaughtered livestock are now generally moved directly from farms, ranches, and feedlots to meatpackers. The cattle-slaughtering sector of the industry, in particular, has become concentrated in cattle-raising regions to the west—namely the western Corn Belt and the Great Plains, where beef is shipped to wholesalers and retailers primarily in the form of fresh primal cuts. Hog slaughtering is still carried on chiefly in large plants, where the hogs are processed into numerous cuts and products.

The industry has also become concentrated to a handful of companies. In 2003, five meatpacking firms—Excel, National Beef Packing, Smithfield, Swift, and Tyson—slaughtered more than 80 percent of the nation’s beef supply.

In accordance with the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act of 1978, all livestock are made insensible before they are killed. Hogs often are immobilized painlessly through gassing. For cattle and sheep, a captive bolt, a type of gun designed for stunning, is generally used. Air-injection stunning, in which air is blasted into the animal’s skull to render it unconscious, was banned in 2003 to prevent the spread of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), a fatal infectious disease that can be passed to humans in a form of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. Air injection can force brain tissue infected with BSE into meat tissue used for human consumption.

Many parts of the slaughtered animals are shipped for consumption as fresh meat; other parts, especially of the hog, are cured and smoked. The fatty portions are converted into lard and commercial grease by rendering processes. Bones are converted into glue, fertilizer, animal feeds, and other usable products, including pharmaceuticals; hoofs and horns are used or sold for other purposes.

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In the late 1990s and early in the 21st century, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) took a variety of measures regulating the meatpacking industry to prevent the spread of BSE in the wake of a BSE epidemic in the United Kingdom and the discovery of a BSE-infected cow in the United States. In addition to banning the use of air-injection guns, the USDA prohibited using meat from downer cattle (cattle unable to walk) in meat products for human consumption and banned the use of brains, skulls, spinal cords, vertebral columns, eyes, and certain nerve tissues from cows older than 30 months. Older animals tend to be more susceptible to BSE. See also Bovine spongiform encephalopathy.

II

Refrigeration and Transportation

The meat of slaughtered livestock, after thorough chilling, is shipped in refrigerated motor carriers to cities. There the meat is delivered to wholesale distribution centers and grocery centers.

III

Cattle Slaughtering

In recent years laborsaving devices have been widely adopted in the dressing and processing of cattle. A continuous rail system is generally used today, whereby cattle are chained by one leg and hoisted to a movable pulley on an overhead rail and are then slaughtered; from this position blood leaves the body so quickly that death occurs almost instantly, and for purposes of kosher ritual this method of slaughtering is defined as humane even without prior stunning. The carcasses then move slowly along a continuously moving rail to stations where each required process is completed, including skinning, disemboweling, and beheading. Before going into refrigeration, the carcasses are cut down the backbone and split into sides. Beef is shipped to wholesalers and retailers as wholesale cuts, such as chucks, rounds, and loins; in fast-distribution plants the carcass is reduced all the way down to retail consumer cuts. Sides and quarters of beef are still sold, but they constitute less than 5 percent of sales.

IV

Hog Slaughtering

Traditionally, hog slaughtering has involved more complete processing at the packing plant than cattle slaughtering. The carcasses of slaughtered hogs also move on continuous rail or chain systems. Most often the hog carcass is first conveyed through scalding vats to dehairing machines. Hogs generally are not beheaded or dismembered in any way during the slaughtering and dressing process, which includes eviscerating, washing, and trimming. Later, however, the carcasses are usually carved up into such cuts as loins, legs, and picnic hams or shoulders. Certain cuts, including loins, are sold fresh, without processing, but most cuts go through one or more processing operations. Although some plants still soak particular cuts in barrels filled with brine, it has generally been necessary to shorten the curing process. To prepare hams, a curing solution is usually pumped internally. Hog bellies, which are used for bacon, are mechanically saturated with curing solution through hollow needles. Many cuts are thoroughly or lightly smoked at the packing plant. Nearly 70 percent of all hogs are slaughtered and fabricated into cuts at the packing plant and shipped to commercial processors who produce a complete line of sausage and cured products.

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