The controversy surrounding major suppliers of processed meat products in the UK and Ireland has deepened today, as horse meat has been discovered in burgers manufactured by two more companies. The news comes after a supplier to the prison service was found to have distributed pies labelled as Halal but containing pig meat to prisons in England and Wales.

Traces of equine DNA were found in beef-burgers from Rangeland Foods in the Republic of Ireland and Freeza Meats in Northern Ireland. In the Rangeland burgers, horse meat accounted for up to 75 percent of meat, whilst horse accounted for 80 percent of meat in Freeza Meats' burgers.

The manufacturers said the meat used in their burgers had been imported from Poland via a meat trader in Ireland. Meat companies supplying Lidl, Asda and Tesco, whose 'beef-burgers' were found to contain horse and pig meat last month blamed suppliers in Spain and the Netherlands for the contamination.

In light of the lack of transparency demonstrated by the discoveries, the Gardai in Ireland have been called in to help Food Standards officials with enquiries as the scandal deepens. Agriculture minister Simon Coveney announced on Monday that police had been called in to investigate whether aspects of the debacle constitute fraud.

FSA meeting over food supply chain standards

Also on Monday, The UK Food Standards Agency announced it will begin to publish the results of industry testing of meat products, "to provide a clearer picture of standards in the food chain" following a meeting with industry high-ups and Defra representatives.

The meeting was called on Monday after the discovery that Northern Ireland-based McColgan Quality Foods had supplied processed meat products labelled as Halal but containing pork to prisons in the UK.

Farming Minister David Heath was present at the meeting, during which FSA officials and food industry players attempted to "agree [upon] a way forward to maintain consumer confidence". The scandal has hit the pockets of major retailers and food suppliers implicated in producing or selling mislabelled food, costing food group ABP alone an estimated £38 million in lost contracts since it initially broke in Ireland in January.

Food and Farming Minister David Heath said on Monday, "This is a shared problem, and it needs shared solutions. Food businesses' agreement to give regular updates on meat testing is a significant move that will give consumers confidence in what they're buying. It's now important that the industry starts sharing this information as soon as possible."

However, sustainable farming groups and food policy experts have argued the scandal is an inevitable result of a laissez-faire approach to food policy and corporate food governance. Commentators including London City University's Tim Lang argued that, rather than being merely a question of traceability, the recent interconnected scandals raise questions about the food system at large.

He said late in January, "There doesn't appear to be a health and safety problem here, but when you get standards being cut, costs being cut, corners being cut on what is being delivered, then health and safety can easily become part of that. The danger is that if we allow a highly squeezed, very competitive food system to deliver low cost foods then cut them down even further, we will get dangerous foods masquerading as real food."

Also in January, Ireland's Organic Trust described the debacle as "yet another failure in the race to the bottom with food quality and prices." A spokesperson for the organic organisation added that, "If we look at all of the recent food scandals - BSE, Dioxins in pork and now burgergate - we have to acknowledge the common thread. All of these problems arise from producers and processors caught in a system where price is king and anything that brings down the price of your produce can mean the difference between survival and bankruptcy."