Good Food Ireland members will serve three meals a day to more than 20,000 delegates from in excess of 100 countries attending the Web Summit in Dublin on November 4th-6th.

The catering hub will be a 100,000 sq ft purpose-built structure in Herbert Park, Dublin 4, adjacent to the Web Summit venue at the RDS. This will also be the venue for Food Summit, a new strand to the programme of events that will feature demonstrations and discussions on food technology, production and ethics.

The attendance expected at Web Summit this year is more than twice what it was last year, when GFI had only 10 days to prepare for the event: "Paddy Cosgrave [Web Summit founder], drove down to my farm at 7.30pm on a Friday evening and it happened 10 days later," said Margaret Jeffares, founder of GFI.

This year, 400 Irish food producers and chefs are involved in planning and delivering the large-scale catering operation. More than 50,000 hot food dishes will be served over the three days, with 4,000 vegetarians and 1,000 vegans among the numbers whose special dietary requirements will be accommodated. The cost of the meals is included in the €800 attendance fee paid by delegates.

In addition to feeding the delegates, GFI will cater for private breakfast meetings and evening dinners, and receptions booked by some of the big names in the tech sector attending, and will use the opportunity to showcase Irish food. “We’re doing a reception for the Nasdaq,” said Jeffares.

“To me this is something quite deeply personal,” Paddy Cosgrave said. “I grew up on a dairy farm. I know the dedication and commitment Irish farmers have to produce high quality food. Each producer is just like a start-up and we want to bring their incredible produce to a global audience.”