The meat-packing industry (also spelled meatpacking industry or meat packing industry) handles the slaughtering, processing, packaging, and distribution of meat from animals such as cattle, pigs, sheep and other livestock. Poultry is generally not included. This greater part of the entire meat industry is primarily focused on producing meat for human consumption, but it also yields a variety of by-products including hides, dried blood, protein meals such as meat & bone meal, and—through the process of rendering—fats (such as tallow). In the United States and some other countries, the facility where the meat packing is done is called a slaughterhouse, packinghouse or a meat-packing plant; in New Zealand, where most of the products are exported, it is called a freezing works. An abattoir is a place where animals are slaughtered for food.
The meat-packing industry grew with the construction of railroads and methods of refrigeration for meat preservation. Railroads made possible the transport of stock to central points for processing, and the transport of products.
History
United States
Before the American Civil War, the meat industry was localized, with farmers providing cattle and hogs for nearby butchers to serve the local market. Large Army contracts during the Civil War attracted entrepreneurs with a vision for building much larger markets. The 1865–1873 era provided five factors that expanded the industry to a national scale:
The rapid growth of cities provided a lucrative new market for fresh meat. The emergence of large-scale ranching, the role of the railroads, refrigeration, and entrepreneurial skills. Cattle ranching on a large-scale moved to the Great Plains, from Texas northward. Overland cattle drives moved large herds to the railheads in Kansas, where cattle cars brought live animals eastward. Abilene, Kansas, became the chief railhead, shipping 35,000 cattle per year, mostly to Kansas City, Milwaukee and Chicago. In Milwaukee, Philip Armour, an ambitious entrepreneur from New York who made his fortune in Army contracts during the war, partnered with Jacob Plankinton to build a highly efficient stockyard that serviced the upper Midwest. Chicago built the famous Union Stock Yards in 1865 on 345 acres to the south of downtown. Armour opened the Chicago plant, as did Nelson Morris, another wartime contractor. Cincinnati and Buffalo, both with good water and rail service, also opened stockyards. Perhaps the most energetic entrepreneur was Gustavus Franklin Swift, who moved to Chicago in 1875, specializing in long distance refrigerated meat shipments to eastern cities. A practical refrigerated (ice-cooled) rail car was introduced in 1881. This made it possible to ship cattle and hog carcasses, which weighed only 40% as much as live animals; the entire national market, served by the railroads, was opened up, as well as transatlantic markets using refrigerated ships. Swift developed an integrated network of cattle procurement, slaughtering, meat-packing, and shipping meat to market. Up to that time, cattle were driven great distances to railroad shipping points, causing the cattle to lose considerable weight. Swift developed a large business, which grew in size with the entry of several competitors. The Bureau of Corporations, predecessor of the Federal Trade Commission investigated the country's meatpackers for anti-competitive practices in the 1900s. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 was the first of a series of legislation that led to the establishment of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Another such act passed the same year was the Federal Meat Inspection Act. The new laws helped the large packers, and hurt small operations that lacked economy of scale or quality controls. Historian William Cronon concludes:
Because of the Chicago packers, ranchers in Wyoming and feedlot farmers in Iowa regularly found a reliable market for their animals, and on average received better prices for the animals they sold there. At the same time and for the same reason, Americans of all classes found a greater variety of more and better meats on their tables, purchased on average at lower prices than ever before. Seen in this light, the Packers' "rigid system of economy" seemed a very good thing indeed.
Changing geography The industry after 1945 closed its stockyards in big cities like Chicago and moved operations to small towns close to cattle ranches, especially in Iowa, Nebraska and Colorado. Historically, besides Cincinnati, Chicago and Omaha, the other major meat-packing cities had been South St. Paul, Minnesota; East St. Louis, Illinois; Dubuque, Iowa; Kansas City, Missouri; Austin, Minnesota; Sioux Falls, South Dakota; and Sioux City, Iowa.
Rail to truck Mid-century restructuring by the industry of the stockyards, slaughterhouses and meat-packing plants led to relocating facilities closer to cattle feedlots and swine production facilities, to more rural areas, as transportation shifted from rail to truck. It has been difficult for labor to organize in such locations. In addition, the number of jobs fell sharply due to technology and other changes. Wages fell during the latter part of the 20th century, and eventually, both Chicago (in 1971) and Omaha (in 1999) closed their stockyards. The workforce increasingly relied on recent migrants from Mexico.
Argentina
Argentina had the natural resources and human talent to build a world-class meat-packing industry. However, its success in reaching European markets was limited by the poor quality control in the production of its meat and the general inferiority of frozen meat to the chilled meat exported by the United States and Australia. By 1900, the Argentine government encouraged investment in the industry to improve quality. The British dominated the world shipping industry and began fitting their ships for cold air containers, and built new refrigerated steamers. When the Argentine industry finally secured a large slice of the British market, foot-and-mouth disease and trade restrictions limited its penetration of the Continent.
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