The Irish beef industry yesterday mounted a €10 million campaign to export more beef at the world's largest food fair in Anuga in Cologne.
The campaign came on the same day as an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Brazil was confirmed.
Brazil and other Latin American countries are major players in the European beef markets and have been targeted by an Bord Bia, the Irish food board, in its huge marketing drive.
While news of the outbreak prompted a call from the president of the Irish Farmers Association for a European-wide ban on the importation of beef from Brazil, the major Irish meat exporters were seeing Brazil's difficulty as their opportunity.
They have been citing competition from Brazilian beef in the European markets as a major factor stifling the growth of exports. Huge quantities of Brazilian and Argentinian beef are consumed in mainland Europe.
Over 7,000 tonnes of Brazilian beef was imported into the Republic last year, mainly for use in the catering trade.
The OIE - the world organisation for animal health in Paris - which monitors animal health across the globe for the United Nations, said 153 animals had caught the disease in a herd of 590 cattle in Eldorado in the south of the country.
There was growing speculation last night that the outbreak, if not contained, could lead to a European ban on Brazilian imports, but this did not happen last year in August when there was a similar outbreak in the north of the country.
However, Mr Dillon called on the EU Commission to immediately ban imports from Brazil, saying a ban was fully justified on human and animal health grounds.
Mr Dillon accused the commission of double standards.
"EU consumers and food safety agencies are demanding rigorous standards from European farmers and rightly so. However, the same cannot be said of the EU's policy on imported products," he said.
