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Meat processing offers a suitable way to integrate whole blood or separated blood fractions (known as blood plasma) into human diets. Thus, there are economic, dietary and sensory aspects that make meat processing one of the most valuable mechanisms for adequately supplying animal protein to human populations, as the following explains: All edible livestock parts that are suitable for processing into meat products are optimally used. In addition to muscle rimming, connective tissue, organs and blood, this includes casings of animal origin that are used as sausage containers.
Lean meat is one of the most valuable but also most costly foods and may not regularly be affordable to certain population segments. The blending of meat with cheaper plant products through manufacturing can create low-cost products that allow more consumers access to animal protein products. In particular, the most needy, children and young women from low-income groups, can benefit from products with reduced but still valuable animal protein intent that supply essential amino acids and also provide vitamins and minerals, in particular iron.
Unlike fresh meat, many processed meat products can be made shelf- stable, which means that they can be kept without refrigeration either as (1) canned heat sterilized products, or (2) fermented and slightly dried products or (3) products where the low level of product moisture and other preserving effects inhibit bacterial growth. Such shelf-stable meat products can conveniently be stored and transported without refrigeration and can serve as the animal protein supply in areas that have o cold chain provision.
Meat processing “adds value” to products. Value-added meat products display specific flavor, taste, color or texture components, which are different from fresh meat. Such treatments do not make products necessarily cheaper; on the contrary in many cases they become even more expensive than lean meat. But they offer diversity to the meat food sector, providing the combined effect of nutritious food and food with excellent taste. Processing technology Meat processing technologies were developed particularly in Europe and Asia. The
European technologies obviously were more successful, as they were disseminated and adopted to a considerable extent in other regions of the world – by way of their main creations of burger patties, frankfurter-type sausages and cooked ham. The traditional Asian products, many of them of the fermented type, are still popular in their countries of origin. But Western-style products have gained the upper hand and achieved a higher market share than those traditional products. In Asia and Africa, there are a number of countries where meat is very popular but the majority of nonusers reject processed meat products.
This is not because they dislike them but because of socio-cultural reasons that prohibit the consumption of certain livestock species, either pork or beef depending on the region. Because processed products are mostly composed of finely committed meat, which makes identifying the animal species rather difficult, or are frequently produced from mixes of meat from different animals, consumers stay away from those products to avoiding eating the wrong thing. But when the demand for meat increases and a regular and cost-effective