On 4 April 2012, the FSA issued a moratorium regarding Desinewed Meat (DSM), stating thatit could
(1) no longer be produced from residual meat on beef and lamb bones and
(2) only be produced from residual meat on chicken and pork bones if classified and labelled as
MSM.
Newby Foods brought judicial review, challenging the moratorium as they felt their process did not
produce what was traditionally thought of as MSM, but produced a product more similar to minced
meat than a slurry.
Through a number of High Court reviews and legal arguments in 2013, 2014 and 2016 (which
included discussion around “Baader meat”, “3 mm meat” and “Desinewed meat”), the Supreme
Court finally ruled that there were three cumulative criteria in defining MSM
1. the use of bones from which the intact muscles have already been detached,… to which
meat remains attached;
2. the use of methods of mechanical separation to recover that meat; and
3. the loss or modification of the muscle fibre structure of the meat recovered through the use
of those processes…irrespective of the degree of loss or modification of the muscle fibre
structure
The judgment of the Supreme Court was that the Newby product was MSM by virtue that
1. The feedstock was bones, etc from manual butchering
2. The process of removing residual meat is mechanical
3. The modification of muscle fibre can occur through standard mincing and as such cannot be
relied on as a definitive pass/fail test for MSM
The ruling was apealed. Discussion around the 3rd part, that Newby claimed minimal muscle fibre
damage, was dismissed after lengthy discussion, but in April 2019 the Appeals Court upheld the
decision, that the Newby process did indeed produce a material that can only be described as MSM.