THE trouble with hanging around the Quality Meat Scotland stand at the Anuga food fair in Cologne is a tendency to lose the independent judgment that is required of a journalist.
The QMS staff are all committed to the cause and indeed the creed which is: "There is no other meat in the world as good as Scotch Beef and Scotch Lamb."
I do not know whether when they are back at their base at the Rural Centre at Ingliston, out
side Edinburgh, they are compelled to attend lessons every morning where that mantra is chanted in unison. Perhaps it is just that they truly believe the statement. Perhaps the QMS non-believers are buried under the heather patch at the Rural Centre.
The possible loss of an independent view on the issue was not helped by the stand being populated by some of the best sales staff around, each representing one of the top meat processors in Scotland. It can be argued that they have to talk up their wares but I got to the point where I had to break out of this small island of confidence just to check how others saw us.
And that was why I was sitting in the Uruguay stand listening to the chairman of their national meat institute. For those who have not been there, Uruguay is a small country with only about three million people but they have about 12m head of cattle some 90 per cent of which are Hereford and Aberdeen Angus and 100 per cent of which are produced on grass.
When asked what his country's ambition was, Dr Luis Silveira said it was to promote their top label Black Label brand in Europe and he added that his country and Scotland should work out a joint strategy for marketing the best quality meat around.
It was difficult to walk past the US stand because it was all bright and flashy. Instead of being repelled by this, I was drawn in by a banner stating that US beef was being imported into Europe.
For a long time, the EU had excluded US beef because their cattlemen are allowed to use hormones in the feed during the fattening phase. But, the head European man at Tysons said they were now producing hormone-free beef that was acceptable to Europe. Tysons is the second largest meat company in the US and its annual turnover is about the same as the Scottish Government's budget – before any Westminster cut-backs.
The six or seven beef-filled containers coming into Holland each week come from its Lexington, Nebraska abattoir which slaughters 5,000 head of cattle a day.
The cattle they are supplying are grain fed, beef-lot-raised stock and, because of the added regulation and management required for this hormone-free beef, are headed for the premium end of the market.
"It is the same end of the market that you Scots are supplying," I was told and so I wandered off thinking the reputation we have has substance.
Coming back to the Irish stand I expected to see them promoting their own beef which they were doing well despite their economic difficulties.
I picked up a leaflet from Liffey Meats, which operates a meat processing unit at its County Cavan base.
The leaflet indicated that its top brand was a "viable alternative" to Scotch beef.
So we are seen to be very much in the top flight as far as beef is concerned. Others copy what we are doing. Dr Silveira was extremely proud of Uruguay's traceability and farm assurance.
I think a nod here should go to the Rothienorman Seer, also known as Maitland Mackie, who initiated the whole farm assurance concept more than a decade ago.
Just as the manager of the football team at the top of the league knows he cannot rest on his laurels, then what should the Scottish red meat industry do next?
There is only one answer and that is to ratchet up our animal health status. There was good news this week on being awarded TB free status.
But government help in co-ordination and enforcement along with a reform of the Single Farm Payment paying more to farmers who operate high health schemes in their livestock should take us another few points ahead of the opposition.
