The drug residue scenario provided an example of how livestock production practices pre-harvest, or from birth to abattoir door, can affect “post-harvest” processing and sale of meat. Obviously, there are many aspects of livestock slaughter and subsequent post-harvest processing that affect final meat quality and safety over which a producer has no control. Conversely, the abattoir and meat processors have no control, except that exerted through market channels, on the product they receive for processing. The responsibility of delivering an animal that can yield high quality, and high value, edible product belongs to the producer. The role of a quality assurance program for production is to devise and implement pre-harvest production practices that ensure quality standards for marketed animals.

Increasingly, consumers are becoming concerned not only with the immediate safety of food, but with all aspects of food production and marketing. The public is becoming better educated about the nutritional implications of food consumption on long-term health and disease incidence. The trend to consume cuts of meat lower in fat and cholesterol to combat potential atherosclerosis and heart disease is a prime example. Consumers are also concerned with the presence of other contaminants or diseases that can arise during the production, or pre-harvest, phase. Further, consumers are becoming increasingly concerned with the conditions in which food animals are raised and their welfare. These issues have put pressure on the livestock industry to respond and use production practices and quality assurance protocols to assuage consumer concern about its product and the pre-harvest conditions under which animals are raised.

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