Revelations last month that beef products sold to some major UK companies contained horse meat have widened to include frozen food brand, Findus. The unfolding situation offers a clear warning to organisations that they have a duty to assure their supply chain for their end consumers.

The Food Standards Agency has, this morning, issued the following statement on the growing debacle: "This is a very serious issue. The evidence we have about the two cases, of the significant amount of horse meat in burgers and lasagne, points to either gross negligence or deliberate contamination in the food chain. This is why we have already involved the police, both here and in Europe.

"We believe that these two particular cases – the frozen burgers from Tesco and the lasagne from Findus – are linked to suppliers in Ireland and France respectively. We are working closely with the authorities in these countries to get to the root of the problem. Our priority remains to protect UK consumers. People have been asking whether it is safe to eat any frozen meat products at the moment. There is no reason to suspect that there’s any health issue with frozen food in general, and we wouldn’t advise people to stop eating it.

"In the particular cases of the Findus lasagne and the Tesco burgers, they have been withdrawn from sale. Anyone who has them in their freezer should return them to retailers as a precaution. In addition to the widespread testing we are doing, we’ve instructed the industry to urgently carry out its own tests on processed beef products to see whether horse meat is present."

Commenting on the suggestion that the inclusion of horsemeat in some food products may have happened through gross negligence or deliberate contamination, Hitesh Patel, a partner in the Information Protection and Business Resilience Practice at KPMG said: "“This situation offers a stark illustration of the risk of supply chain failure and should serve as a large wake up call for all organisations, not just those in the food sector.

"Regardless of whether horsemeat entered food products through criminal activity, fraud or mistaken contamination, this situation starkly illustrates the importance of robust counterparty due diligence for organisations in today’s market and poses some stark questions as to how far down the chain those procedures should go.

“A drive to cut costs through the supply chain can have unintended consequences, he adds. "At a time when trust – from customers, regulators and government is an important issue across many sectors, relinquishing control over suppliers can have considerable ramifications.”

Findus itself said in a statement: “At Findus UK our first priority is our customers and providing quality products they can trust. But we know that many people have been concerned by the news this week that tests have shown that some of our Findus Beef Lasagne has been found to contain horse meat. We understand those concerns, we are sorry that we have let people down and we want to outline the facts.”

It says that tests confirmed that horse meat was present in a number of samples of a particular product, withdrawn on 4th February 2013.

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