Tesco in the UK rationalised its whole approach to meat procurement following the BSE crisis, a senior executive will tell delegates at a European Meat Forum in Dublin today.
Mr Steve Murrells, category director for meat, will explain how the company introduced a code of practice in a bid to improve farm animal welfare and to boost consumer confidence. The BSE crisis of 1996, which he describes as "a wake-up call for the industry", drove down beef consumption by 28 per cent and it took the next four years to recover sales.
He says to restore and maintain the confidence and credibility of consumers, beef not only had to be safe but it had to be seen to be safe. "The radical shift in our buying policy, to work with fewer, dedicated suppliers, has given us greater control when it comes to production methods, traceability and food safety. It also makes good business sense, through improved scale efficiencies, better teamwork, more dedication and a greater incentive to ensure Tesco sales grow faster than the competition," he says.
Simplicity often is the key to quality, although simple is not necessarily easy. "The supply chain needs to be as short as possible, as transparent as possible."
His experiences and those of other retailers will be of interest to the 170 European meat buyers attending today's conference, organised by Bord Bia.
According to Mr Michael Duffy, the food board's chief executive, this is an initiative to accelerate the rate of recovery in beef consumption on EU markets as a result of beef safety scares. Ireland sold almost half its £1.26 billion (1.6 billion) beef and live cattle exports to other European countries in 2000.
"We have made some progress, if you start on the basis that consumption in the EU will have recovered to 8 per cent down on 2000. But 2000 was 13 per cent down on 1999. So there is a significant surplus of beef overhanging the market - around 1.2 million tonnes," he says.
While exports to Britain in the current year are expected to reach 170,000 tonnes, compared with 115,000 tonnes last year, he attributes that to "supply-chain gaps" because of the foot-and-mouth situation.
