Sugar consumption is of extreme importance for LAB proliferation in meat and for the associated type of spoilage. LAB occurring in meat can be obligate heterofermentative or facultative heterofermentative. The first produce lactic acid, acetic acid, CO2 and ethanol, while the second give two moles of lactate from glucose. An inducible phosphoketolase activity is expressed in heterofermentative LABwhen pentoses are present and it catalyzes their conversion into lactate and acetatewithout gas formation