On-Farm Food Safety: Cattle

The Canadian beef cattle industry's reputation for product quality and safety has substantial implications for trade and consumer confidence. Trade is particularly important to Canada as increasing supplies of Canadian beef are being exported south across the border and to the Pacific Rim. Over 50% of Canadian production is exported.

The Canadian Cattlemen's Association has been working since 1994 to develop quality assurance programs for beef producers in Canada these are based on the principals of Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP).

The Canadian cattle industry developed an initiative to assure continued market access and consumer confidence. The Canadian Beef Industry Quality Assurance & Product Safety Program was instituted in January 1995.

In January 1996, the Canadian Beef Industry Quality Assurance & Product Safety Program was renamed Canadian Cattlemen: Quality Starts Here to further articulate the responsibilities and initiatives of producers and industry to ensure the quality and safety of Canadian beef. The main objective of the Quality Starts Here program is to develop a comprehensive, national on-farm food safety and quality assurance program for the beef cattle production industry.

The guiding principles of the program are:

"We produce food, not cattle"
"Product safety and quality are a shared responsibility from pasture to plate." Each link in the food chain including producer, packer, transportation, auction market, retail and/or food service outlet and the consumer, is critically important.
"Improvements in management practices that influence quality, will lead to improvements in product safety".
"If industry leads the initiatives, we will realize our objectives".

For more information on this and other On-Farm Food Safety programs, contact Betty Vladicka.

For more beef industry links, check out the Beef Cattle Info Zone website.

On-Farm Food Safety: Cattle

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