According to Irish Examiner.com, the IFA welcomed the move, and applauded the retail chain on sourcing and selling only 100 per cent Irish meat and poultry. The increase to pig farmers will have no impact on the price that shoppers pay.

SuperValu trading director, Eamon Howell, said: "As one of Irish farming’s biggest customers, we met recently with the IFA who described in detail the difficult position of Irish pig farmers. We discussed the real distress in the pig meat sector due to the significant increases in input costs, because of the rise in world grain prices."

IFA national pigs and pigmeat chairman, Tim Cullinan, said: "SuperValu is a major and important supporter of Irish pig meat and is one of our industry’s biggest customers. This commitment it has made is very welcome by everyone in the pig farming industry and we look forward to increased co-operation between ourselves and this quality Irish brand."

Across SuperValu’s range, 75 per cent of produce is either sourced or produced in Ireland, worth €2.85 billion annually to the economy. This includes sales of more than €1bn worth of fresh Irish food.

This policy of sourcing from Irish suppliers and producers helps to support 14,000 jobs in supplier companies, as well as over 250,000 people in the Irish farming and food industry.