Mj. Vanoeckel et al., INSTRUMENTAL EVALUATION OF MEAT QUALITY C HARACTERISTICS OF BELGIAN SLAUGHTER PIGS, Die Fleischwirtschaft, 77(1), 1997, pp. 84-87
The objective measurements of acidity (pH), light scattering (FOP), co
nductivity (PQM) light absorption (Gofo), lightness (Labscan L), redn
ess (Labscan a), yellowness (Labscan b*) and water holding capacity (
WHC) were evaluated for their suitability in estimating meat quality i
n a population of about a thousand slaughter pigs. The animals were di
vided in three meat quality categories based on pH(1): 21.2 % of the c
arcasses belonged to the PSE class, 10.4 % to the slightly PSE class a
nd 68.4 % were considered as normal meat. As expected, all the measure
d meat quality parameters, except Labscan a, showed significantly dif
ferent results between the PSE and the normal meat class. Even between
the normal meat and the slightly PSE meat most of the parameters were
significantly different. The parameters measured in the slaughterline
(45 min. post mortem) were significantly correlated with each other:
pH(1)-FOP1 (-0.72), pH(1)-PQM(1) (-0.69), FOP1-PQM(1) (0.80). The pred
ictability of the ultimate meat quality (paleness, hue, exudative) wit
h the initial measurements in the slaughterline was rather low. Princi
pal component analysis showed that 56 % of the total variation in the
different meat quality parameters could be explained by the first thre
e principal components. Based on the first principal component a disti
nction could be made between PSE and normal meat, but the intermediate
slightly PSE meat class strongly overlapped with both meat categories
. The best parameters for the prediction of PSE meat, based on pH(1),
were FOP1 and PQM(1).