Greetings, friends. Im Chad Carr.

I work in the Department of Animal Sciences at the

University of Florida. Im an associate professor and Extension meats specialist. Id
like to welcome you to the first installment of The Meat We Eat. This initial week we
will be discussing the history of meat animal production in the US. In our second
lecture, we will discuss our system within in the US of meat animal production and
processing. In our third installment of this initial week, we will have a guest lecture by
my friend and colleague Dr. Dwain Johnson. He will compare how meat production
and processing occurs in our country as it compares with other developed and
developing countries.
1
As we initially think about the history of meat animal production and processing in
this country, we first need to start with where they arrived. The only food animal
which is native to North America is the turkey. So as we think through the food
animal species that are associated with the meat products that we produce cattle,
hogs, pigs, sheep, goats, even horses in many other cultures, as well as avian species,
with turkeys and chickens none of those with the exception of the turkey is native
to North America. All others came in as we had the explorers come in so many years
ago. Additionally, so as the initial settlers came into North America, we had what a
largely just one step above a hunter-gatherer society, as most do in many developing
countries. This started to really change with the establishment of the industrial
revolution toward the middle of the 19
th
century on through the start of the 20
th

century. Up until that time, we had a situation in which we would have very short
periods of fresh food. Then, the products could possibly be canned or salted or
preserved in some way or another, but, for the most part, prior to the establishment
of efficient transportation and refrigeration, everything had to be close to the source.
We would take and allow in the times of plenty, we would put away food for the
times of few.
2
As we think about the start of the 20
th
century and there some of the later part of the
19
th
century, the US, as a lot of us are certainly aware, we are a country of
immigrants. Folks that came in from Western European countries, much as we were
having in the developing US at that time, we had very small areas in which fresh food
was driven by a local agrarian community. The folks in these little regional areas
developed their own meat processing techniques and their own niche products. As
these Western European immigrants came into the US, they brought those products
with them. That led to not only the science of meat processing, but certainly the art
of meat processing as well. So as we think about all over Western Europe, folks from
all different parts of Italy and Germany, and how that associates with the different
fermented and further processed products and all the dried cured products that we
offer from parma ham to braughtworst to Italian sausage, etc. Probably the two
events that had the greatest ramifications on us in this country changing from a
largely agrarian society to a more urban and industrial population would be the
advent of railroads for mass transportation and the establishment of efficient
refrigeration. Up until that point, there was starting to be some commercial meat
animal slaughter and meat processing, but it was in areas close to the Great Lakes
where they could take some ice and put that under some sawdust and use that to last
for a little longer period of time to keep products chilled and extend their shelf life.
But, with the establishment of effective railroads and certainly by the early part of the
20
th
century as refrigeration became further developed it allowed faciilitation of large
scale production throughout the US.
3
If we look at these pictures, all of this commercial production initially started as we
stated around the Great Lake and it was all headquartered in Chicago. The
establishment of the Chicago stockyards and the establishment of further processing
there. There were four large further processors that were involved in buying live
animals, taking those live animals and converting them into a carcass and that carcass
into component pieces and then to further processed product. That was what set
precedence in our industry relative to having an excellent food distribution system in
the US.
4
As this system was being established there in the early part of the 20
th
century, it was
based on the idea, much like we have now, that it was a high volume, low fiscal
margin industry. In order for folks to be profitable, we had to have great throughput
in order for these companies to proliferate. These facilities, a lot of them utilized
gravity. They would start with live animals on the top of the facility and would allow
the products to it would be a three or four story facility and we would slaughter on
the top floor and then products would go down as gravity went to the bottom floor
with further processed products on the bottom. There would be multiple species that
would be slaughtered within those facilities. They might slaughter beef cattle on a
Monday, then they would slaughter pigs on a Tuesday, etc. As we stated, all of this
was really headquartered there in Chicago. That was the home of the Chicago
Stockyards, that was really the home of these four large packers which really started
to transcend the meat industry. There in the early, early part of the 20
th
century
Upton Sinclair soon wrote the book The Jungle. As we think about Upton Sinclair and
his story, Upton Sinclair was a socialist. He was interested in the social injustice
associated with the folks who worked in meat processing facilities at this time. He
wrote this expose about how these folks were treated, discriminated against. They
worked unjustly exceptionally long hours, lots of child labor concerns there. It was
really a dangerous place. But as he wrote the book relative to this social injustice,
what came out in this book was all the terrible problems that we had in terms of
sanitation. Soon after that, after Upton Sinclair wrote The Jungle, the following year,
the US Government passed that all products that are going to be sold at retail or food
5
service, those animals must be slaughtered under mandatory USDA inspection to
ensure food safety.
5
By the early 1960s- the red meat industry in
Chicago declined due to the development of
cheap truck transportation and an effective
interstate road system. These Chicago
facilities were old, inefficient and generally
slaughtered multiple species, also there were
challenges relative to labor costs and a strong
union presence an rumored corruption with
these facilities.

Collectively, the pork industry moved a little bit,
but the beef and lamb feeding industry moved
quite a distance, primarily to the US High
6
Plains- TX & OK Panhandles, Western KS,
Eastern CO, Central NE. These areas were
not and still not are extensively populated, but
have easy access to rail lines to ship feedstuffs
efficiently. Additionally, these areas have a
more arid climate, which although it can get hot
there, more evaporative heat loss can occur
compared to a more wet climate.
6
There was a large scale paradigm
shift- stimulated by Iowa Beef Packers
(IBP) in Denison, IA. They decided to
reduce the amount of skilled labor
needed at each retail or foodservice
establishment, they would fabricated
the carcasses into vacuum sealed
subprimal pieces instead of marketing
swinging sides & quarters

Their facilities were & are single
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species, with a reasonable bit of
automation. Another key component
that transcended the meat industry
was adding value to the by products
generated at slaughter.

7
The modern US meat industry is a very
global business- driven by safety,
sustainability, and adding value.

It is very consumer and convenience
driven, but the technology to ensure safety
is science based, efficient, and competitive

The business is a high volume/ small
margin. It is also highly regulated- USDA-
FSIS addresses all facets of food safety in
the red meat & poultry industry, the FDA
8
addresses the use of any drugs or feed
ingredients to live animals, OSHA
addresses worker safety of what is a very
dangerous business , and the food
workers unions are a very viable
component of the industry as well

8
These topics will all be addressed
throughout the class bur- In the US-
Over 50% of meals are eaten away
from home, few people can cook and
few meals eaten as a family
It is an industry that is largely driven by
convenience and muti-tasking
However there is some growth in
consumers wanting to know where
their food comes from which has led to
some growth in the
9
Organic/Natural/Local Foods markets

9
We as a society consume a lot of animal protein, with chicken certainly exhibiting the
most growth in retail disappearance over the past 30 years due their marketing
strategies as being healthy and how the poultry industry has done a great job of
creating convenience products
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