Structural Change or Logical Incrementalism? Turbulence in the Global Meat System

In the last ten years the global meat industry has encountered numerous critical events related to food safety and food quality. These events in turn have caused the industry to re-evaluate how the meat supply chain functions and how to service the new social attributes demanded in the market place. This paper uses a unique methodology, shedding light on why and how the US meat industry is evolving and why its evolutionary path may differ from that which is occurring in Europe. 1 Some of these strategies and new marketing approaches are already in place in the US meat industry. For instance, warehouse clubs, food service entities and some meat processors have started marketing campaigns of branded products to change meat commodity perception to a value-added category (Major, 2001). Likewise, new initiatives of vertical coordination between producers and processor to assure quality products and share financial risks are becoming common (Katz and Boland, 2000). Government agencies, like the USDA, are supporting process-verification systems to control and verify each phase of meat processing (Castaldo, 2001). Nonetheless it is difficult to assess whether these strategies represent a current trend or an isolated initiative. binnenw. chain & network 2002-2 03-12-2002 12:01 Pagina 101