The Meat Institute submitted comments to the Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) in response to the agency's proposal to amend beef standards to include dentition and documentation of the age as an additional determination of maturity grouping for official quality grading of beef carcasses. The Institute said it supports the proposed changes to methods to determine maturity group assessment, and requested that AMS continue using current programs and processes to determine dentition and actual age without additional changes. Specifically, NAMI stated that there is a scientific foundation to modernize beef grade standards. The Meat Institute also argued that proposed maturity determinations are already covered by USDA regulatory programs, including by the Food Safety and Inspection Service, which has in place routine dentition verification activities in federal beef establishments.
Source: The North American Meat Institute (NAMI)