FROZEN PORK

Hokitika Guardian, 18 March 1932, Page 8

FROZEN PORK

.SCIENCE HELPS INDUSTRY.

‘VNEW EXPERIMENTS AT b CAMBRIDGE.

LONDON, February 3.

'Scientific experiments in progress at the, Low Temperature Research Station at Cambridge, under the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, have proved that frozen pork, which hvd been .stored for a longer period than would be necessary to send it to Great Britain from Australia and New Zealand, can still be made into very good bacon.

It; wa6 with the object of finding out exactly how far frozen pig meat is liable to deterioration in ’’ «torn vo , dur ag transport, and the best ways of bringing it over from the Dominions, that an investigation was started. It was carried 1 out at Cambridge, where there is one of the best equipped low temperature laboratories in the world. This is Government-owned, and is support od partly by grants from the Empire Marketing Board. A staff of experts is continually at work here studying the behaviour in cold storage of. many sorts of foodstuffs, from pears to pork, and finding methods of improving storage and irransport conditions which will help the oversea producer.

There are two ways' of putting Australian and New Zealand bacon on the market; One is to send it over ready cured. The other is to export it as frozen pork and have it cured in Britain. •

• CURED IN BRITAIN. It has been definitely shown by scientific :vork that mild-cured bacon cannot yet be satisfactorily ( transported over long 'distances. So no simple way has been found of preventing the; fat turning rancid after about 6-8 week s storage? ! T%isi]Wrnative, however, gives saltisfactory.'refillts. Bacon fully as good as the Dutch', and very little inferior to the Danish, can be made ill Britain from meat .'.sent, from Australia and New Zealand as frozen pork. There is no reason,' moreover, why the quality should not be improved by more care at ©tub stage of pig production and of transport and storage of frozen carcases. Australia and New Zealand are now Britain’s chief sources of supply ol frozen pork. Exports from New Zealand in 1930 were valued at £510,000. As the dairy industry expands in the two Dominions, the .disposal of surplus pigs will become increasingly important, for pigs are a 'by-product of dairying. The frozen pork trade is, therefore, likely to grow steadily. These experiments will help it tu do so by eliminating the distance facto'', so that.frozen pork could be -sent to any country in the woJid. — |