Celebrating 25 years of eating quality outcomes
26 March 2024
2023 marked the 25th Anniversary of MSA, the world’s leading eating quality grading system. The 2022–23 Annual Outcomes Report (AOR) highlights the progress of the MSA program including the record $259 million estimated farmgate returns to MSA beef producers in 2022–23. Access all the updated data in the full report.
Other highlights for the MSA program in 2022–23 include the improvement in the MSA Index of 57.52 compared to the previous year’s result of 57.37. MSA graded cattle represented 54% of the national slaughter and compliance to minimum MSA requirements was 95.1%
The MSA AOR provides a snapshot of the MSA beef grading program, including changes in the proportion of grain and non-grainfed cattle, number of cattle graded in each state, compliance and non-compliance rates.
Quality and consistency remain the key reasons why independent butchers and wholesalers stock MSA product and brands underpinned by MSA grading, with 78% of butchers rating their satisfaction with MSA graded product as ‘very good to excellent’. MSA product also sells at a higher price differential than non-MSA products.
International activity has continued to grow, with the MSA team working alongside MLA’s international markets teams to deliver 19 workshops online and in-person to over 400 participants in 2022–23. Working with six large supply chains in markets including the USA, Canada, Japan, Singapore and Vietnam, MSA is enabling processors and brand owners to extract further value from the MSA program, through training of in-market staff and customers to better understand the MSA program and how they can best utilise MSA graded products in their market.
