Confused Tesco horsemeat -plot thickens!

thefenman

But seriously, don't buy 'em. Buy decent mince and make your own.

Teahfc

No matter what you say you cannot produce any quality food product at the prices that the supermarkets want to retail at.

The profit margins that the big supermarkets work on and the pressure to reach price points for retail sales can only mean corners are cut.

Mad Cow, bird flu, now horse meat (although its a moral thing rarther than a quality issue, no one wants to eat something that maybe had a name do they?) all could be prevented if the right amount of money was offered to the supplier.

Mr T and all your friends stop asking for 35-45% profit on some of your fresh foods and start to look after your customers rather than just your share holders !

Take it in turns as a nation to buy in different weeks from big supermarket until the others raise and lower there prices to keep both supplier and customer happy.

Edwardia

Joanna Blythman, author of Bad Food Britain and What We Eat writes for the Guardian and The Grocer

http://www.thegrocer.co.uk/opinion/stop-horse-play-with-food-and-that-includes-gm/235872.article

frugal_shopper_2

Teahfc wrote: »

Mad Cow, bird flu, now horse meat (although its a moral thing rarther than a quality issue, no one wants to eat something that maybe had a name do they?) all could be prevented if the right amount of money was offered to the supplier.

It's the media that are suggesting it is a moral issue but in reality a quality issue is exactly what it is.
Ingredients (pork & horse meat) were not listed on the product labels so nobody could make an informed choice as to whether or not they were happy to consume them. It is not clear where those ingredients came from therefore it is unclear whether it was meat that was fit for human consumption or not. There is an awful lot of meat that passes through abbotoirs which is rejected for a wide variety of reasons some ends up used as pet food the rest is disposed of. If the pork & horse meat in the products is unlisted then then how do we know if it passed all the quality control procedures the rest of the ingredients had to go through.

antrobus

Edwardia wrote: »

Whether it's true or not, the perception is that Tesco turned a blind eye to the junk being mixed into the value burgers by the processors.

Having read several articles about the cost pressure which Tesco puts on suppliers, IMO the processors may have been so close to the fiscal cliff themselves that they felt forced to buy in cheap from wherever - thinking that no-one would be able to find stuff in the burgers.

Whether Tesco is being economical with the truth or not, the future doesn't look good for the processors.

If Tesco won't deal with you, that's a big chunk of dosh lost. If Tesco says it won't trust the processor anymore, will the other supermarkets using the processor pull out too ?

Sometimes some good comes out of food controversy and if DNA testing becomes the norm that will make the food supply chain safer.

See this BBC news report - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21267262

And in a separate development, the Co-operative Group revealed independent tests of its own-brand burgers supplied by Silvercrest found traces of less than 1% horse DNA in three samples, and more than 17% in one sample.

The affected products have been withdrawn from sale and the Co-Op has joined Tesco in "delisting" Silvercrest as a supplier.

maxtweenie

My info is that Tesco are going to introduce routine DNA testing of all their meat supplies, and pass the estimated £2 million a year onto the suppliers. I don't care what they say, the consumers will end up footing the bill ultimately. Or in this case I suppose, hoofing it. :rotfl:

gailey_2

But why are tesco not taking silver crest to court?

If they so badly breeched?

I expect they possibly go bust

just seems odd thourght was protein was euroipe other week now its meat from poland.

Still dont think we know the truth.:(

gailey_2

missed the select commitee hearing as on school run.

tried to google/research but not much coming up.

did find this however from irish times



Meanwhile, Britain's Food Standards Agency (FSA) has said Irish authorities are sure that “filler product” found in contaminated burgers sold in supermarkets came from Poland and was a mixture of beef and horse offcuts. The contaminated meat was in the form of blocks of frozen product from a Polish supplier that had been used for a year, FSA chief executive Catherine Brown told the House of Commons Environment Committee in London today. Investigations are going on into how long contaminated meat might have been in use, Ms Brown told MPs.

block of frozen crap from poland doesnt sound appetising to me.

Its still refers to it as filler product yuck.

I had no idea.:(

Edwardia

http://www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx?meetingId=12451

Here is the Select Committee meeting full video.

NB they turn the sound off between batches of witnesses.

lindseykim13

Scary stuff, but has probably made a lot of people think a lot more about what they are eating.
We already made the choice to stop eating as much factory processed stuff as possible and glad of it.