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What do you think are the positives and negatives concerning cloning of livestock for food production ?
Will the cloning of meat be the final nail in the butchers coffin ? Once all livestock becomes that uniform, will it then be the time for the robots to take over ? fact or fiction?
Here are some replies and answers,
Larne Nelson •
Cloning will only ever be for livestock and as we
all know de-boning of carcasses can be difficult in larger animals.
Chickens yeah in factories use machines to split the birds yet boneless
breast still need manual hands. Death of butcher in traditional will
come back to supermarkets and consumers.. Cloning will only in theory
re-create a beast that had record meat-bone percentages.. yet the factor
we all forget with cloning it's still has to eat and feed can vary from
season to season even with using labs to get percentage the same,
weather conditions are things we can change nor can we control even
with sheds etc.
Reply
Larne
With the scientific methods of feeding deployed already today, producing
uniform stock will not be hard , you only have to look at the pig
industry to find that model. I have seen lamb carcass's completely
deboned by a machine, lasers to cut bone and hydraulics to remove femurs
so it is already here. The fact that these plants will be able to get
livestock that are all the same will definitely be an asset to
supermarkets, They then will be able couple that with all the advances
in storage and preservatives. Then they really will turn meat into tins
of beans.Our generation think they have see mass production.
They aint seen nothing yet...
Your comments please.
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Where will the next generation of butchers come from ?
I spent some time today
discussing with a well respected colleague who is from the meat
recruitment industry about the availability of good quality butchers.
He was in agreement with me that the pool of butchers of my age is
getting smaller and smaller and as that happens the pool of young
people wanting to come into the butchery industry is also declining
prorate
I have in the past been called a supermarket basher. I assure you I am not.
But I would like the supermarkets and the meat trade in general to reflect on this.
Before the supermarkets
you could find half a dozen butcher's shops on every High street that
were always doing new different and innovative things to outdo their
rivals. Sadly in stark contrast of this today the supermarkets are
really only interested in competing with each other, by price and are
basically driven by their insatiable quest for turnover. Yes they make
noises about dry aged,, matured, bred outdoors but what they are
basically doing is playing lip service to the current fashion trends
for food.
When the butcher was on the high street the biggest
recruitment drive that he ever did was to employ teenage Saturday
boys. They would then get an experience of working with some of the true old
masters who made our trade something artistic, satisfying,
interesting, skilful but most of all fun. Not all of these boys
remained as high street butchers but went on to become skilled
slaughtermen commercial boners, manufacturers, catering butchers and
so on attracted by very high earning potential. They were the life
blood of the whole industry .
The picture the youth of today have of
our industry is very different. Low paid, working in the cold,
stacking shelves, very little contact with the general public or
working on a production line.
We should take a lead from what
the great young Chefs have done for their industry by glamorising it
and showing that preparing food. and make no mistake that is basically what we all
do. Can be a rewarding career not just from the point of enjoying what you do but
also financially. We are producing a generation of chefs now that are
really pushing the boundaries but that learnt their skills from old
masters. Why not butchers ?
I have worked with many
great International chefs and they all agree that finding really good
butchers is almost impossible today and that they have to train their
own butchers in house now.
We should take a lead from what the great young Chefs have done for their industry by glamorising it and showing that preparing food. and make no mistake that is basically what we all do. Can be a rewarding career not just from the point of enjoying what you do but also financially. We are producing a generation of chefs now that are really pushing the boundaries but that learnt their skills from old masters. Why not butchers ?
I have worked with many great International chefs and they all agree that finding really good butchers is almost impossible today and that they have to train their own butchers in house now.
There are plenty of older butchers I know that left the industry because the market place then, was so competitive and the onslaught of the supermarket trade forced many high street butchers out of business this caused a glut of butchers to become available and this in turn reflected in the salaries they received. These men would willingly return to the industry if only they could be recognised as skilled tradesmen and be rewarded accordingly. This group of people still have the passion for butchery and would love to have a last throw of the dice by passing on their knowledge as teachers to the next generation, but the window of opportunity is closing rapidly as these men become older.
So I say to the supermarket giants, step up to the plate and take responsibility for the retail meat industry that you now dominate and encourage young people back to the industry by initiating real apprenticeships for young butchers taught by real craftsmen but also give them the financial incentive to do so and elevate them above the rank of shelf stacker. Believe you me you will be repaid tenfold in both profitability and turnover.
The time for real schools of excellence is now but sadly without your financial support they will flounder like a ships upon the rocks. The butchers that have survived the onslaught by the supermarkets on the retail meat industry. Do not have the problems of recruitment that the supermarkets seem to have.
--
Wayne Harper
Master butcher
