The not-for-profit Australian Pork Limited (APL), which is managed by pork producers and aims to promote Australia’s pork industry, has launched a new campaign to highlight the pink square PorkMark – a guarantee that a bacon product is 100 per cent Australian.

The APL is promoting the PorkMark in the lead up to Australian Bacon Week, which will run next week from 18 to 25 March 2012.

According to consumer research undertaken by the APL, 95 per cent of consumers who say they prefer to buy Australian bacon find the current labelling for bacon very confusing and, at times, misleading.

‘Made in Australia’ does not mean the product is made from Australian grown pork – only that it has been manufactured in Australia. This pork can be imported frozen, thawed out and then manufactured into bacon in Australia.

APL’s CEO Andrew Spencer said, “The only way to be really sure you’re buying bacon or indeed any type of smallgoods product made using Australian pork is to look for the pink Australian PorkMark as your guarantee of Australian origin.”

Australian Bacon week
Australian Bacon Week is being organised by the ALP as a show of support for the local pork farmers as well as bacon, ham and smallgoods manufacturers that are committed to using and selling products made with 100 per cent Australian pork.

Mr Spencer said, “The week is the celebration of true blue Australian bacon rather than from imported pork used to make 65 per cent of small goods sold in Australia.

“Countries like Denmark and Canada have highly subsidised agricultural industries and as such are able to export frozen product in enormous amounts, destined for smallgood manufacturing. Over 2.6 million kilograms of foreign pig meat – AU$8.5 million worth – arrives in Australia every week,” Mr Spencer said.

Australia’s Best Bacon award winners announced
This year, 115 bacons were registered as part of the APL’s National Bacon Awards for Excellence, entries were then judged by two chefs and a fleishmeister on a variety of factors including appearance, aroma, texture, shrinkage and of course, taste.

Yesterday, Federal Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, the Hon Joe Ludwig, announced the winners of the Australia’s Best Bacon awards.

Peter G Bouchier from Moorabin, in Victoria, took out the top gong for the nation’s best full rasher. Judges described his entry as a “perfectly proportioned, dry cured rasher, with a sweet aroma, lovely tender texture and excellent flavour”.

For the second year in a row, Schulz Butchers, from Elizabeth West in South Australia, took national number one for the short cut category.

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