Improving transport container design to reduce broiler chicken PSE (pale, soft, exudative) meat in Brazil

Abstract

Throughout the chicken production chain, transport from farm to the commercial abattoir is one of the most critical sources of stress, particularly heat stress. The aim of this work was to describe the performance of a new prototype truck container designed to improve the microenvironment and reduce the incidence of pale, soft and exudative (PSE) meat and dead on arrival (DOA) occurrences. Experiments were carried out for four different conditions: regular and prototype truck, both with and without wetting loaded cages at the farm (for bird thermal stress relief) just before transporting. While there was no difference in the DOA index (P ≥ 0.05), the prototype truck caused a reduction (P < 0.05) in the occurrence of PSE meat by 66.3% and 49.6% with and without wetting, respectively. The results of this experiment clearly revealed a low-cost solution for transporting chickens that yields better animal welfare conditions and improves meat quality.

Turkey Meat. Seasonal Effect on Meat Quality and on Dead on Arrival Index in a Commercial Plant

“…During the summer season, poultry breast meat showed high L* and low pH values. In Brazilian summer high L* values were found in poultry 6,[20][21][22] , and this phenomenon obviously is related to the season climate (Table 1) being the heat located outside the comfort zone (18 to 30 °C) 6,[22][23] . During the preslaughter phases, the microclimate of transport truck container is also an important factor that influences the meat quality ( Table 2).…”

“…Six portable weather meter devices with bidirectional Kestrel anemometers and data logging capability were set to take measurements at an interval of 30 seconds during the journeys 15 . The transport temperature (TT), transport relative humidity (TRH), air ventilation (AV), ambient temperature (AT), ambient relative humidity (ARH), heat index (HI) and wind chill (WC) values were simultaneously measured as in Spurio et al 6 , allowing for a representative analysis of the heterogeneous distribution of the thermal microenvironment within the loaded vehicle. The weather conditions in moment of transport were characterized by temperatures (AT), and the relative humidity (ARH).…”

“…A total 30,720 turkeys were transported from 64 different farms. The percentage of DOA per loaded truck was calculated by counting each dead bird during the hanging step at the slaughtering plant, taking care to observe the truck region from which the birds were collected 6 . DOA = Number of birds dead / Number of birds transported…”

“…Two conditions are known under stress pre-slaughter: pale, soft and exudative (PSE), and dark, firm and dry (DFD) that are developed as the result of stress in the short and long-term, respectively 5 . In summer, the climatic effect can induce PSE problem in birds 6 , as well as processing after slaughtering 7 . Owens et al 8 and Barbut et al 9 suggested that PSE poultry breasts can be classified by color in the processing plant due to its high correlation with the functional properties 2,10 .…”

Parameters of Physiological Responses and Meat Quality in Poultry Subjected to Transport Stress

“…Recently there are various concerns about poultry transport due to these three major facts [1,2]. Firstly, mortality may be raised by different transport.…”