Typical products of the small ruminant sector and the factors affecting their quality

Abstract At the present time, the farmers have to diversify the production types to maintain their market position and to fall in with consumers demands. They have privileged the typicality to create a fidelity with the consumers in the small ruminant production system, because of the long tradition and its less industrialisation. Of course the mean of this term varies according with people culture and tradition and with production (cheese, meat, fibre). In cheese field the differences between geographic areas, culturally homogeneous, are evident. In United Europe the historical and traditional motivations prevail and these products are protected by low. Some cheeses give their typicality to a breed, some other to the cellar, to a technique or to a feeding system. In USA, safety is the most important condition for the consumer. In Latin American countries people are giving more and more importance to the typicality even if there is a lake of regulations. In meat sector the situation is the same. The meaning of quality and typicality changes according to the local customs. In the more developed areas carcass quality is evaluated by grids that determine the price of the product. The quality indicated on many labels is made according to some grid evaluation. Quite different is the situation of the fibre sector. In the last years, the textile industry is discovering certain interest towards the typicality as regards the home-made, the ecological production and the naturally coloured wool. Consumers appear to be attracted by the typicality message if this term has some contents. Research is trying to study some factors influencing the typicality and in this report we referred about theirs. The future of a lot of small ruminant production depends from the capacity of research organisations to explore and to find the scientific reasons of typicality.