An estimated 80,000 frozen ready meals prepared by an Irish company have been withdrawn from shops and supermarkets in Ireland and Britain after some were found to be contaminated with glass.
The products originated from Rye Valley Foods, part of the Kerry Group, which is based in Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan.
They were withdrawn after the company received 20 complaints about meals sold in Britain, in which the rice was found to contain small pieces of rounded glass. The glass was traced to a batch of rice imported from the US by the food company.
The meals were sold under the Birds Eye, Supervalu, Tesco and Centra labels in Ireland and under Asda and Sainsbury's labels in Britain. They included chicken and beef dishes.
Newspaper advertisements published by the brands involved have asked the public to return some of the products, identified by batch code, most of which contain best-before dates of October 2007. The Food Safety Authority of Ireland also issued a food alert in relation to the products.
Frank Hayes, director of corporate affairs with Kerry Group, said the glass did not cause a health and safety issue.
"They were absolutely tiny, hard and rounded and our X-ray equipment failed to pick them up," he said. "They caused no problems, but we deemed it responsible to withdraw them."
He said the long-grain rice in which they were found was shipped from the US. "We traced it to a single shipment, there was no question of malicious damage," he said.
The company is confident the contamination was an isolated incident.
Rye Valley Foods produces more than two million ready meals a week but it could not say how many meals were being withdrawn from Britain and Ireland. Tesco Ireland has said it is withdrawing up to 20,000 packs while Birds Eye will take back 40,320.
The Musgrave Group, of which Centra and Supervalu are members, said last night it did not have figures on how many packs would be withdrawn. But it is estimated it will withdraw at least 20,000.
Mr Hayes said Rye Valley Foods could not give an accurate figure for the total number of products withdrawn from Ireland. "These products have a long shelf life. Some may already have been consumed, some may be sitting in freezers," he said.
"We do not have figures at this point."
