Meat quality is a term used to describe a range of attributes of meat. Consumer research suggests
that tenderness is a very important element of eating quality and that variations in tenderness affect
the decision to repurchase. The present paper highlights recent information on the factors that
affect tenderness. While the precise aetiology is not fully understood, a number of factors have
been shown to affect tenderness. Of these factors, postmortem factors, particularly temperature,
sarcomere length and proteolysis, which affect the conversion of muscle to meat, appear most
important. However, it is now becoming clear that variation in other factors such as the muscle
fibre type composition and the buffering capacity of the muscle together with the breed and
nutritional status of the animals may also contribute to the observed variation in meat tenderness.