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Abstract
Cattle hide is one of the valuable by-products from beef enterprise. The hides are used as raw materials
for leather industry. Locally, the quality of cattle hides is rather low due to some managerial factors. The
practices of an existing supply chain from green hides as well as salted hides to an end user do not offer any
traceable way to the origin of problems for improving quality of hides. This paper described an attempt to
improve the management of cattle hide in order to achieve higher added value. A model of hide clusters of related
operators, from upstream to downstream, with the mutual aim at upgrading hide quality was classified to facilitate
operational research and development. The cluster consisted of a beef Cooperative as a core link to farmer
members, slaughter workers, salted hide collector, and tanner. The results showed that the quality of hides was
much to be improved due to three major factors i.e. the management and handling of cattle on-farm, hide removal
at slaughter, and hide salting. Cluster identification enabled the first step of traceability of hides to systematic
approach toward improving their quality. A traditional method of hide preservation by salting in cement
container with flat bottom was studied in comparison to that with curve bottom, the invented one. A new
technology, a prototype of stainless drum for hide salting, was also introduced for trial. Four hundred and fifty
hides, each without parts of hide from head and four ankles, mostly from Kamphaeng Saen beef cattle breed with
an average slaughter weight of 550 kg were used to do an experiment on hide salting. Factors affecting the quality
of salted hide were the amount of salt used, the duration of hide stacking, and salt-tolerant microorganism. Wet-
blue hides obtained from this research were assessed to identify any sources of defects on hides. It was noted that
the defects due to hide removal by hand at slaughter could be lessened firstly. In addition, a standard for hide
quality was drafted. Moreover, this paper offered suggestions for the cooperative efforts of the hide clusters,
especially ways and means of profit sharing with the farmers who improve the management on-farm for better
hide quality, and future research topics.
Keywords : cattle hide, hide salting, traceability, quality hide cluster, hide grading
Introduction
Cattle hide is a valuable by-product from beef production in agricultural sector. Hide marketing starts
off at a slaughterhouse from where an upstream of hide transaction chain, in the form of green and / or wet salted
hides, exists and goes to an end at a tannery via hide collectors of different scales (Skunmun
et al
., 2005).
Commonly hide price is based on sizes associated with any visible defects on hide. The sizes of hide are classified
as small, medium and large by a range of weight, and the price varies due to the sizes and the weight within the
size. There are a lot of hide transaction chains throughout Thailand, but the quality of cattle hides is much to be
improved due to three major origins of problems i.e. the management and handling of cattle on-farm, hide removal
at slaughter, and hide salting (Skunmun
et al
., 2007). It is interesting that the traders along each chain do not
