Interview : “Good for the trash was turned into meat patties”

INTERVIEW : Former director of the quality department of a major slaughtering and cutting company, Pierre Hinard signs "Omerta on meat, a witness speaks ”, a book about the hidden undersides of meat factories…

You'll never look at your hamburger or frozen lasagna the same way again. The urge to convert to vegetarianism will even take hold of you, upset and nauseous reading Omerta on meat, a witness speaks (Grasset), Pierre Hinard's book to be published this Thursday. Agronomist, he is named in 2006 quality director at Castel Meats, one of the largest meat processing companies in Loire-Atlantique and discovers the unsavory side of an agri-food industry which, motivated by the quest for profit, has no qualms about “making consumers eat shit”. After trying things from the inside, in vain, Pierre Hinard is fired for alerting veterinary services about a batch of meat unfit for consumption. Returned to his thirty Salers cows fattened with organic grass and treated with essential oils, he signs a firebrand which throws a paving stone into the pond and confides in 20 Minutes.

Your book denounces the uninspiring quirks of the "meat factories", what's the worst on our plates ?

Obviously, and fortunately, this only concerns part of the production, but in fact, I saw green meats, stinky, sometimes stuffed with maggots and who, instead of ending up in the dumpster as I ordered, were made into hamburger steaks, even those who end up on the children's plate. And steaks cut from unsold products in a supermarket, they too good for the trash, be shipped to a restaurant chain more than forty days after the slaughter of the animals - instead of the eight-day period prescribed by law. Not counting frozen meats, thawed and refrozen without regard to the cold chain, lack of traceability, tagging trafficking and other miscellaneous things.

It is difficult to imagine that these meats pass through health controls, is the chain corrupted at all levels? ?

Of course ! Customers, large distribution, restaurant chains, fast-foods and agri-food companies that manufacture ready-made meals, everyone turns a blind eye as long as they buy their meat at the lowest price. They do not hesitate to feed the cows with cereals and soya, when they should be fed grass and hay. We pass you dairy cows, worn to the cord and not meat breeds, and horse for top quality beef ! The industry is not learning from the past, the mad cow obviously did not calm them down.

Continuation and end on 20minutes.com

"Omerta on meat, a witness speaks ”, a book about the hidden undersides of meat factories…