October 9, 2022 – 1:30 am
The cutting scheme established by the national government begins in November. Support and criticism.
The marketing of half beef will end on 1 November, when the cutting scheme established by the national government will come into force, which sets the limit of 32 kilos for the distribution of meat in the country. This new wholesale marketing scheme decided through the then Ministries of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries; Work, employment and social security and productive development, through joint resolution 4/2021, will come into operation in 21 days, after a year and a half of time for the conditioning of cold rooms.
For the Government, this measure “represents higher quality and health standards for meat products, while at the same time promoting commercial transparency and making progress towards greater modernization of the meat half-carcass distribution chain”. Furthermore, it aims to “make the marketing chain more efficient” and implies “acting in defense of the consumer”, the participating portfolios assured at the time, given that “half-carcass marketing generates inefficiencies in the allocation of cuts that affect the price that he must pay”.
Sources from the National Service for Health and Agri-food Quality (Senasa) indicated that they continue to collaborate with the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries “regarding progress in adapting refrigerators to be in line with regulations that have been issued by the Ministry of Labor, and required by the International Labor Organization (ILO) “. From Senasa they specified that “of the refrigerators that are in the register of the agency, which are those of export and federal transit and which represent 85% of the massacre of Argentina, 80% already have the object enabled for the quartering. the rest advances in adequacy ».
“On the other hand, it is expected that those who cannot send the meat to the retail market in pieces can take the half carcasses to a cycle 1 or cycle 2 factory that is quartered,” they indicated.
However, this initiative has generated divisions within the meat sector, as those slaughterhouses dedicated mainly to export ensure that there is enough time for the factories to adapt to the new provision and that it will benefit consumers and workers, while butchers and suppliers of the internal market believes that the conditions for undertaking such a scheme are not yet given and expects an increase in prices.
The president of the Consorzio Esportatori Carni (ABC), Mario Ravettino, said that “the measure is very positive”, and considered that the marketing of the half-carcass is “an archaic and outdated distribution system. You cannot continue with the half-meat on the shoulder, “he stressed.
