Avaliação econômica do uso de filme stretch em carcaças bovinas resfriadas no município de Imperatriz - MA

Abstract

Beef is the main source of animal protein present in human food. In order for it to be fit for consumption, it needs careful handling and storage, from slaughter to commercialization. The cooling of the post-mortem bovine carcass seeks to ensure this food safety, enhancing the validity and maintaining the desirable characteristics in the meat.The objective of this research was to provide beef slaughterhouses with cost reduction techniques to evaluate the economic viability of the use of stretch film in the packaging of bovine half carcasses, where 50 male animals. Same batch were selected and each half - carcass was weighed before cooling, to obtain the weights of the hot half - carcass, with half of each carcass being covered with stretch - type packing (Treatment Group) and the other half refrigerated without the package (Control Group). After cooling, the temperature was measured and each cold halfcarcase was weighed, and then the absolute losses (in kilograms) and relative losses (in percentage) resulting from the cooling process of each Group were calculated. The half-carcasses were cooled in the same cold room, under the same temperature conditions, to avoid differences arising from the air circulation in the refrigeration process. For packaging, each half-carcass of the treatment group was wrapped every set of skeletal-skeletal tissues from the extremity of the hind limb to the muscles of the cervical region using stretchable polyethylene film of the type Stretch Coil Model 50X0025. The use of the film in the half - carcass was efficient in the maintenance and reduction of the weight loss in the cooling, but it was difficult to gain cold and it was not economically feasible to the establishment.