Daily Skiff

February 19th, 2008

Beef recall won’t affect TCU, Dining Service representative says

The beef at TCU’s dining facilities is not among 143 million pounds recalled by a California company after an order from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the marketing manager for Dining Services said.

Ligia Abato, marketing manager for Dining Services, said TCU does not receive meat from the Westland/Hallmark Meat Co., which was recalled Sunday because of concerns that cattle were not properly inspected. The amount of beef available in dining facilities has remained the same, Abato said.

“Our meat forces are secure and have been handled properly,” Abato said. “Everything here is a quality product.”

Anthony Owens, director of media relations for Sodexho USA, said Westland/Hallmark is not an approved supplier for the company. Owens said some Sodexho cafeterias in K-12 schools that receive meat from the National School Lunch program may have been affected, but it was difficult to get an exact number of schools affected because it would have to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. No universities participate in the National School Lunch program, Owens said.

Owens said Sodexho was aware that there was a chance the company’s K-12 school cafeterias had Westland/Hallmark beef and the company issued a hold on the product Jan. 31.

Two former employees of Westfield/Hallmark have been charged with animal cruelty after a undercover video made by the Humane Society of the United States showed workers kicking and shocking animals too sick or injured to walk into the slaughterhouse on their own.

Veronika Terrian, senior history major and coordinator for student advocacy group People for Animal Well-Being, said factory conditions at farms can lead to unhealthier products. She said consumers can cut back on meat intake or choose other options such as free-range and hormone free meats, as well as voice their opinions to lawmakers to let meat companies know change is needed.

“As Americans, our greatest voting power is with our dollar,” Terrian said. “We can show these industries that we do not approve of their processes.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 19th, 2008 at 2:57 pm and is filed under Newsroom, TCU in the News, Campus News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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