Executive Summary Highlights Carcass Merit Study

For many years the beef industry has been on a mission to deliver consistently higher quality beef to consumers.   To communicate the results of one of these efforts, the Beef Checkoff Program has produced a brochure highlighting the Carcass Merit Project, a five year checkoff-funded study to assist cattlemen in identifying animals that can consistently produce carcass traits that make great beef.

The 14-page four color brochure, entitled “Finding Live Animal Traits for Better Beef,” communicates the results of the project in a succinct, easy-to-read format, explaining how and why the study was conducted, looking at the results and showing cattle breeders how they can use the results to improve the quality of their herds.

Funded by beef producers through their $1-per-head checkoff, the Carcass Merit Project was coordinated for the Cattlemen’s Beef Board and state beef councils by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA).  The NCBA serves as one of the Beef Board's contractors for checkoff-funded programs

This five year study is working to help the industry ensure a pleasurable and consistent eating experience by looking for specific quality traits in animals, such as tenderness, juiciness, composition and overall palatability.  Ultimately, the industry will address these qualities not only through postmortem technology but through selective breeding. 

The research showed that, to varying degrees, all the breeds identified sires that can pass along valuable beef quality traits to their progeny.  It also provided helpful information about chromosomal regions within the bovine genome that influence these quality traits. That information and the extensive database will be a valuable tool for the further identification of genes and the development of commercially available gene tests for palatability traits.

"We hope that this printed document is helpful to all members of the cattle industry," says Dave Nichols, Carcass Merit Steering Committee member and a seedstock producer from Bridgewater, Iowa. “The more cattlemen utilize this research, the more the industry will benefit across the board.”

To obtain copies of the brochure, contact Elizabeth Dressler, Product Enhancement Research, NCBA, by email at edressler@beef.org. The executive summary is also available as an easily downloaded PDF on the www.beef.org Web site under research, product enhancement.