Truth in labelling legislation for beef has been passed in NSW, but the concept has some hurdles to negotiate before it becomes enshrined in national law.
The controversial Bill, which had the unusual distinction of being strongly supported by many beef producers but contained several make-or-break sticking points for industry bodies like the Red Meat Advisory Council (RMAC), passed unaminously through the NSW Upper House on Friday.
The Bill's political champion, Independent Member for Northern Tablelands, Richard Torbay, said the Bill is "a victory for consumers, producers and for the industry".
"When consumers find consistent quality through a reliable labeling system they are expected to put beef more often on their shopping lists.
"It’s been a long time coming and has taken hundreds of meetings and some very robust discussion to get to this point."
The industry has been given six months to work through some of the controversial detail, particularly the issue of descriptors, before the Food Amendment (Beef Labelling) Bill 2009 is finalised.
Industry bodies, including RMAC and Meat and Livestock Australia, took exception to earlier proposals for labelling old cow beef cuts as "low quality" or "low grade".
As a result of negotiations, the Bill's early intention to legislate retail beef descriptions was modified by Mr Torbay to enable the beef industry to write its own descriptors.
On the day of the Bill's passage through the Upper House, AUS-MEAT announced its new Domestic Retail Beef Register, a document intended to guide retailers translating supply chain descriptor language to beef cuts sold to consumers.
The industry now has six months to develop a standard set of retail descriptors for the NSW market.
How well this succeeds will be a key factor in whether the Bill is adopted as national legislation.
But there is an even bigger issue: whether a new grading system will be needed to underpin accurate retail descriptions, and if so, what form that grading system should take.
Cattle Council of Australia president Greg Brown is strongly opposed to describing beef by dentition (the number of teeth, which provides an age range for the animal) because it provides no indication of eating quality under the right cooking method.
Meat Standards Australia (MSA) grading was designed to achieve exactly that outcome, but for many producers–particularly those in remote areas, like Mr Brown's home turf of Mt Garnet, Queensland–distance from an abattoir or other factors places them outside MSA pathways.
AUS-MEAT's new domestic register continues to base its descriptors on dentition, in Mr Brown's view raising some big questions about whether a useful retail descriptor system can actually be created on the current model.
"Consumers are pretty confused about how beef is described, and I guess we have to accept some of the responsibility for that, but it's a very complex business describing beef because there are so many different cuts and grades and cooking methods."
Widening the MSA criteria to embrace all beef, regardless of source, would get the industry around those issues.
"We need to put some more horsepower behind that idea," Mr Brown said.
"We don't have an issue with truth in labelling, but we certainly have an issue with the way this is being done and that industry doesn't have carriage of it."
NSW Farmers Association Cattle Council chair Richard Chamen said the passage of the Bill was generally good news for the NSW beef industry, provided some minor details were be resolved in the next six months.
"It's a happier result than what we had 12 months ago," Mr Chamen said. "It needed a fair bit of industry consultation to get right."
The Primary Industries Ministerial Council (PIMC), in consultation with industry, will now examine whether the Bill can be converted Federal legislation.
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