Previous Page: Getting the ball rolling

After additional statistical modeling, Reagan says USDA established a line acceptable to the industry. “USDA is now satisfied from a scientific standpoint that the instruments can accurately determine the grades,” he says.

“Standards needed to be applied in a uniform manner nationwide,” Dolezal says. “The new USDA standards address industry concerns about variation in the original model.”

Graders vital to the process

Though the machines will be operated by plant personnel, USDA will retain total oversight and control of the process, O'Connor says. Graders will be needed, for instance, to assure that images are being captured appropriately and under optimum conditions.

And the new technology can't capture everything. Maturity of the cattle and the firmness of the meat, for instance, will be judged by graders, and dark cutters can only be identified by humans. Graders can also reject instrument findings if it appears the image wasn't captured or analyzed within acceptable parameters.

O'Connor says USDA graders must go through two years of training, which continues to be valuable. “We have the highest confidence in this workforce,” he says. “But now the graders will have a competency that people in the past wouldn't have had access to.”

Although questions about instrument grading were raised by graders early on, “as they became more familiar with the video image analysis (VIA) system and saw the role they would play in oversight, they recognized the value of the technology,” O'Connor says.

“There's value (in instrument grading) in both directions — to producers and to consumers,” Dolezal says. “And it's very valuable in helping make decisions at the chain speeds we operate today.”

Walt Barnhart is a freelance writer and communications consultant based in Littleton, CO.

For more on VIA systems, visit www.vision-for-you.com or www.rmsusa.com