Enhancing Poultry Meat Quality: A Comparative Study of Conventional Vs Organic Cobb 500 Broiler Production

Abstract

Driven by population growth, the demand for poultry meat is escalating. Customer perception of meat from free-range chickens is healthier and more flavourful than meat from poultry raised through intensive methods. This belief arises from insights into consumer awareness regarding chicken meat from free-range pro-duction. This study focuses on the quality of poultry meat of organic output using Cobb 500 broilers to assess carcass characteristics, nutritional quality, and sensory evaluation. 30 chickens from the organic production were slaughtered at ages between 42 to 45 days for conventional chickens and 65 days and older for organic chickens. The organic chicken had a protein content of 22.8% and a fat content of 1.6%, while they contained 72.7% moisture and 1.6% ash. The organic meat achieved a mean rank of 6.50 ± 0.51 for overall acceptability in sensory quality. Based on the measured nutritional composition and sensory attributes, organically reared Cobb 500 broiler meat exhibited higher protein content, lower fat content, and greater sensory acceptability compared to conventionally reared meat. These findings indicate differences in meat quality attributes between production systems under the conditions of this study.