Brakes red tractor breakthrough

ONE OF THE country‘s leading food wholesalers has agreed to mark its new meat range with the Little Red Tractor Logo.

Brakes which supplies food to schools, hospitals and restaurants, has an annual turnover of over £1.4bn.

The company will use the logo on meat sold through a specialist company called Prime Meats which it will launch on Aug 2.

The decision has delighted the National Farmers Union and Assured Food Standard (AFS), who see it as a breakthrough in getting transparency in the labelling of food used by the catering industry.

“This is great news for British farmers and a ringing endorsement of the quality red meat and poultry they produce,” said NFU president Tim Bennett.

“The NFU has been campaigning for assurance to be adopted in foodservice for a long time and Brakes‘ use of the Little Red Tractor means customers will now know that they‘re buying an independently audited, farm assured product.”

Terry Jones, head of the union‘s food chain unit, added: “It takes the guess work out of things for customers. It means if customers want to buy British they can.”

AFS chairman Colin Smith said the Little Red Tractor showed that the food was produced under farm assurance schemes to the British Farm Standard.

Each product was also independently inspected along all stages of the food chain.

Research carried out by the Meat and Livestock Commission in 2002 showed that customers would prefer to eat in restaurants serving British meat.

Diners actually assume that the meat they are served is British even though much of it is not.