Scottish meat in the frame?
Scottish meat in the frame?
IF the little red tractor logo, launched by the NFU this week, proves popular with consumers, it could be used to help promote Scottish meat.
According to Dumfriesshire farmer Donald Biggar, vice chairman of the countrys new red-meat promotion body Quality Meat Scotland, if the logo is a hit with the public then Scotlands food producers might have to embrace it.
"But our objective is to maintain our separate and superior identity for Scottish meat. The little red tractor logo has government backing and support from supermarkets – our customers. So we may have to adopt it, but only alongside our own Scottish identity marks," he said.
The process of amalgamating the Scotch Quality Beef and Lamb Association (SQBLA), the Scottish Pig Industry Initiative (SPII) and the work of the Meat and Livestock Commission in Scotland to create QMS is now gathering speed. Newly appointed managing director Alasdair Muir began work this week, with his first job to amalgamate the staff of the three organisations ready for the July 1 official launch of QMS.
Indications are that there is to be no senior role in the new organisation for Brian Simpson, SQBLA chief executive, which will inevitably add fuel to the fire of opponents to QMS.
One of the most vociferous is Dumfriesshire farmer Andrew Stuart Wood. He has sent a petition to the Scottish Parliament, which is due to be heard in the next fortnight, calling for an investigation into the way QMS was established.