Dawn Farm, a subsidiary of the Queally group, which supplies cooked meats used as pizza toppings and sandwich fillings, had turnover of 330m last year, according to recently-filed accounts.

The 3% rise in turnover was swallowed up by 1.9m in additional distribution and administrative expenses during the year. The net result was a 14% drop in pretax profit to 10.1m.

The company, the largest privately-owned agri-food business in the state, had shareholders' funds of 65.6m at the end of the year.

Dawn Farm, based in Naas County Kildare, invested 28m in a state-ofthe-art meat science and innovation centre earlier this year which the company plans to use to help it to develop new products.

Dawn Farm chief executive Larry Murrin said at the time that the company is also hoping to make inroads into continental European markets and is targeting additional sales of 60m from those markets over the next five years.

Already more than 80% of Dawn Farm Foods' sales originate outside Ireland.

The company exports meat products to more than 30 countries.