- The bills of sale from the sale of cattle to brokers and not always meet the legal requirements needed to prove that the cattle were sold by the producer (e.g. in a court of law). Legislation should be put in place to ensure that bills of sale are consistent and legal.
- When cattle are purchased by brokers and abattoirs, legislation should be put in place to require payment and grading results within 3 days of killing. (This used to be the case until recently.) Currently it often 6-8 weeks before payment and grading results are made available. This means that there is no way to review the meat in case of disputes because it has already been shipped.
- When a downgrade is made on an animal (e.g dark cutters, age downgrade) then a process should be in place to allow a producer to dispute the downgrade and review the carcass.
- Abattoirs should provide the live weight of each animal prior to butchering, and the carcass weight after dressing, so that the dressing percentage can be calculated by the producer.
- Yields and Dressing Percentages: “The dressing percentage is the percent of the live animal that ends up as carcass. Generally, the carcass weight is taken immediately after skinning and evisceration and is commonly known as the hot hanging weight. There are a number of factors that will affect the percentage including how much the animal has eaten before it is weighed, and how much mud or fiber is on the animal. These factors negatively correlate to the dressing percentage, by reducing the dressing percentage. The amount of fat and muscling will positively affect dressing percentage; the heavier or fatter an animal, the higher the dressing percentage. The dressing percentage can be calculated as such:Dressing Percentage (DP)= (Carcass Weight / Live Weight) x 100”
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