The Minister for Agriculture and Food, Mr Walsh, will continue to push for the EU regulations on beef labelling to be extended to cover the catering trade.
At the launch yesterday of the first report by the Department of Agriculture and Food's Consumer Liaison Panel, the Minister said this gap in the beef labelling regulations would have to be changed.
"This issue is due to be discussed in the Council of Agriculture Ministers next month following the presentation of a report on the system which is being carried out by the Commission," he said.
"When the Irish consumer sits down in a restaurant and looks at the menu and wants to eat Irish beef, he or she is entitled to that information at the very least."
However, he warned those who wanted to ban the import of beef from outside the EU that this was not part of an open economy, especially here, where we exported 85 per cent of our own food production.
The proper labelling of food products emerged as the most important issue for consumers in the past year, the chairwoman of the Consumer Liaison Panel, Ms Mairéad McGuinness, said.
Ms McGuinness said it was her belief that in an increasingly global food market, consumers should be told where food comes from, even if providing this information presented problems for food processors and retailers.
"If knowledge is power then the only real power consumers have in terms of the food they eat is to know as much as they can about it," she said.
She said many consumers told her committee that they would like to know where their food came from, and the panel was carrying out research on the needs of the consumer.
This was particularly true, she said, when there was a growing problem with allergies to certain foods, like peanuts, where UK research had showone in 70 people were allergic to them.
Mr Walsh said he was disappointed that two issues raised by the panel with him, the National Beef Assurance Scheme and the Dairy Hygiene Regulations, had not been implemented.
He said Bord Bia's Féile Bia scheme, under which food outlets guarantee to sell locally produced meat, was useful but faced the difficulties encountered by all voluntary schemes.
IFA president Mr John Dillon endorsed the panel's call for the proper labelling of beef by origin at catering outlets.
"This issue deserves more urgent attention than it is currently being given by the EU authorities," he said.
"The issue of unidentified imported beef being used in the catering trade has been highlighted by IFA for some time and is the subject of a current DNA testing programme by IFA in a random sample of hotel and restaurant outlets," he said.
Agri Aware also welcomed the panel's findings on the labelling of beef, particularly beef used in the catering industry.
Its chairman Mr Mike Magan said Agri Aware research had consistently shown that when eating out, consumers wanted full information on the country of origin of meat.
"Today's findings by the Consumer Liaison Panel are to be welcomed. We look forward to consumers' wishes being addressed with an extension of the labelling regulations into the catering sector, so consumers know where their food comes from," he said