RASTREABILIDADE NA BOVINOCULTURA DE CORTE: REVISÃO DE LITERATURA

Abstract

Traceability is an animal control system that allows individual identification from birth to slaughter, recording all relevant occurrences throughout their lives. Past episodes in Europe (ie, bovine spongiform encephalopathy and outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease) have reaffirmed the need to provide consumers with meat that guarantees quality and food safety. In this regard, traceability is an important tool to ensure this purpose. This work was carried out with the objective of discussing the importance of traceability, citing and describing the main methods of animal identification used in tracking, as well as its advantages and main programs and Brazilian regulatory norms. Among the main advantages, it is noted that, by being able to inform everyone involved in its production chain about the distribution of products and their by-products, tracking guarantees the cattle rancher to act legally in national and international trade. In addition, traceability can be an interesting tool to add value to products, through quality certification and market differentiation. Another advantage worth mentioning is the possibility of a stricter and more effective sanitary control, since the alerts generated allow the rancher to better manage health and cutting handling.