The Government is being urged to take over the Jeanie Johnston replica Famine ship or lose it to a private operator, possibly abroad.
The call has come from the Jeanie Johnston Company set up last year to rescue the €15.5 million ship. Most of the money spent on the ship, which went four times over budget, came from State funds.
The company, comprising Kerry Group, Shannon Development, Tralee Town Council and Kerry County Council, was to have ended its relationship with the ship at the beginning of 2004.
It hoped the Government would take over. However, behind-the-scenes negotiations to convince the Government of the vessel's training and tourism potential have not succeeded.
The ship, now berthed in Cork, will complete another transatlantic voyage this year, according to a statement issued after a board meeting on Thursday night.
Some 100,000 people visited the ship in North America, and the success of the transatlantic voyage last year convinced the board that the ship has potential under Government ownership, a spokesman said.
"We firmly believe the ship can have a successful future for tourism promotion, sail training and cross-Border initiatives," he said.
Shipwrights and young people from the North have been involved since the laying of the keel in Blennerville, Tralee, in the early 1990s.
Last year some 93 people from both both sides of the Border took part in the voyage to the US funded by the Wider Horizons programme of the International Fund for Ireland.
"In the absence of Government interest in acquiring the ship, the directors of the Jeanie Johnston Company will have no alternative but to actively pursue a sale option," the statement said.
Tralee Town Council, which initiated the project, is €2.5 million in debt and has taken out a 15-year loan to finance the debt.