National Beef Quality Audit - 2016

Since 1991, the beef checkoff-funded National Beef Quality Audit (NBQA) has delivered a set of guideposts and measurements for cattle producers and others to help determine quality conformance of the U.S. beef supply. The first NBQA a quarter century ago focused on fed steers and heifers and the physical attributes of beef and beef by-products – marbling, external fat, carcass weight and carcass blemishes. The beef industry conducted its first market cow and bull audit in 1994 to complement the NBQA for fed steers/heifers. As the foundation of cattle herds, cows and bulls are also sources of beef that are significant and worth understanding. In fact, it’s estimated that sales of cull breeding animals contribute up to 20 percent of operational gross revenue for both beef and dairy operations. Cattle industry concerns over the years have evolved to include food safety, sustainability, animal well-being and the growing disconnect between producers and consumers. As a result, over the past 25 years NBQA researchers have made significant changes to their research, leading to increasingly meaningful sets of results.

There were several major elements to the 2016 Steer and Heifer and Market Cow and Bull National Beef Quality Audits: Face-to-Face Interviews provided understanding of what quality means to the various industry sectors, and the value of the quality attributes. This research will help the industry make modifications necessary to increase the value of its products. In plant assessments included evaluation of fed steers and heifers as well as cows and bulls in holding pens, on the kill floor and in the cooler for characteristics related to transportation, mobility, bruises, condemnations and quality and yield grade characteristics, and many other traits. In the Strategy Session industry representatives met to review results of the research and discuss industry implications for both the steer and heifer and cow and bull NBQAs. Outcomes from that meeting provide quality guidance to the industry for the next five years. Lastly, lost opportunities are calculated for each audit to give perspective to the value of the quality defects identified during in-plant assessments.

The National Beef Quality Audit is funded by the Beef Checkoff program and managed by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, a contractor for the Beef Checkoff. Authors VanOverbeke, Belk, and Savell are the principal investigators for the project and would like to thank the other institutions and subcontractors that helped collect data for Phase II of the project.