Red Meat: Health-conscious Consumers Ecstatic As Dr Pewan’s Work Breaks Down Fatty Amino Acids In Sheep Breeding, Makes Cholesterol Free Meat Available
The Oasis Reporters
January 30, 2025
Health-conscious consumers increasingly demand healthier, tastier, and more nutritious meat, hence the continuous need to meet market specifications and demand for high-quality lamb.
Australian based Dr. Shedrach Benjamin Pewan’s work has used “targeted sequencing of lipogenic genes in Tattykeel Australian white lambs to improve meat quality”.
Meat eating quality with a healthy composition hinges on intramuscular fat (IMF), fat melting point (FMP), tenderness, juiciness, flavour and omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 LC-PUFA) content.
“These health-beneficial n-3 LC-PUFA play significant roles in optimal cardiovascular, retinal, maternal and childhood brain functions and include alpha-linolenic (ALA), eicosapentaenoic (EPA), docosahexaenoic (DHA) and docosapentaenoic (DPA) acids”.
He unravelled the underpinning molecular mechanisms for fat melting point, healthy omega-3s, and marbling.
Meat sheep producers can use these DNA marker-assisted selection tools to improve feed efficiency, commercial cuts, and healthy lamb.
Imagine the scenario of a middle-aged man being invited to a meal as the pleasant aroma wafts to his nostrils. He sighs and tells the host that he can’t partake of it because the meat is mutton. He fears a drive in his cholesterol levels because he is hypertensive.
Well, he needn’t worry anymore because veterinary medical scientists like Dr. Shedrach Pewan and a few other Sheep breeders from diverse countries under the leadership of their supervisor and team leader, Malau-Aduli (also a Nigerian born but Australian-based Professor in Animal and Veterinary Science (Genetics & Nutrition)), have long since broken down all the worry in the breeding of Sheep that they have done at James Cook University in Queensland, North East Australia.
Dr Shedrach Pewan’s work, in conjunction with the international team based in Australia, has indeed done a lot to improve the Meat-eating quality indices just by improving feedlot performance, carcass traits, and commercial wholesale cuts of lot-fed Tattykeel Australian White (TAW) MARGRA lambs as a result of dietary fortification of the diet with omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 LC-PUFA).
When the process was evaluated, it showed that the problems of metabolism which certain people with health problems fear in consuming beef has been adequately catered for. Their work revealed that Tattykeel Australian White (TAW) lambs have higher levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL), also known as “good cholesterol” and desired by the body, and low levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), “bad cholesterol”, which aggravates cardiovascular diseases, cancer, diabetes, obesity, and neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases.
In the quest for a meat sheep breed with good body conformation, superior eating qualities, low fat melting point (FMP), high intramuscular fat (IMF) and healthy n-3 LC-PUFA composition, the Gilmore Family in Black Springs, Oberon, New South Wales, pioneered the development of the Tattykeel Australian White (TAW) breed.
This breed was developed over a 15-year period of rigorous breeding, culling and selection of Poll Dorset, Dorper, Texel and Van Rooy rams and ewes with an extensive utilisation of embryo transfer, artificial insemination and natural mating.
The team unravelled the peculiarities of this Sheep breed, so the quality of mutton in the breed is safe for just about anyone to eat, including the aged. The fear of cholesterol in red meat in this breed does not arise.
The interesting aspect of this groundbreaking work is that Dr. Shedrach Benjamin Pewan and his Supervisor, Professor Aduli, Enoch Othniel Malau Aduli, are both Plateau State of Nigeria-born citizens who happen to be in the academic research field in Australia, doing outstanding work that enriches the global knowledge economy. Plateau State has reported severe inter-ethnic clashes between the nomadic Fulani Cattle herders and the sedentary farmers who are indigenous to the state.
Sheep farmers in Australia are very pleased because of this breakthrough. Sales have boomed since everyone now goes for this meat.
And guess what?
Sheep farmers are enjoying a big boom. Chinese importers of Mutton from Australia are unable to meet market demand. Everyone wants the breed. Australian Tattykeel Platinum has sold for a record $240,000 to the Elite Syndicate.
What a glorious time to be a Sheep farmer in Australia! Thanks to Nigerian Scientists.
Greg Abolo
gregabolo@gmail.com.
