An apology was demanded from the president of the Irish Farmers' Association, Mr John Dillon, by a major hotel group over his remarks that hotels were buying untraceable imported meat if they had not signed up to a Bord Bia programme.
Mr Dillon had been highlighting the report that 25 per cent of beef eaten in the Republic, 31 per cent of pigmeat and 34 per cent of poultry consumed here were imported.
"If you are eating out in a restaurant, bar, or hotel and they do not have the Féile Bia programme, it is most likely that you are eating imported meat which is not produced in Ireland," he said.
But last evening the chief executive of the country's largest independent hotel group, Ms Oonagh Murray Nealon, said Mr Dillon's remarks were "wholly inaccurate and false and should be immediately withdrawn".
She said the 60 Manor House and Irish Country Hotels she represented regarded the Bord Bia scheme to encourage the quality assured schemes as laudable and members were encouraged to sign up. But it was still a voluntary scheme with no obligation to sign up, she said.
Hoteliers, she added, were busy people and many simply had not got around to tackling the paperwork associated with the Féile Bia scheme, adding that she expected the IFA president to work with the industry rather than making false allegations.
Mr Dillon had also attacked the Government for failing to support Irish meat producers by not insisting that the Defence Forces and health boards use Irish produced and labelled produce.
He said that when surveyed, these organisations said they had issued tenders via the EU tender procedures. Only one of the health boards contacted had replied in full, he maintained.
Most of the non-traceable product was going into the catering sector but some of it was also going through the retail sector.
"We do not object to competition from anywhere, but we believe that our product is better because it can be traced down to the farm and we have to compete against other producers who do not face the stringent conditions we operate under," he said.
In reply to questions, he said that Irish farmers would be quite happy to see their names on menus in restaurants or hotels but they were not getting the chance to do so.
An Bord Bia, which had been criticised for allowing the home market to be taken from Irish farmers, said meat imports into Ireland had grown from 65,000 tonnes to an estimated 102,000 tonnes last year.
All of the growth in imports had been in pigmeat and poultry products, which now accounted for 85 per cent of all meat imports.
"As a major meat-trading nation, significant quantities of this were reprocessed and re-exported. In pigmeat, we estimate a quarter is re-exported and the share in beef may be even higher," it said.
Its Féile Bia programme, launched with the trade, had 400 establishments signed up and Bord Bia's message to the public today is to eat out with establishments that had signed up to Féile Bia.