The Food Safety Authority of Ireland is investigating whether the feeding of imported fish meal to salmon is a cause for health concern.
Its investigation was initiated after reports that a BBC television documentary, to be broadcast on Sunday, had found farmed salmon can contain up to 10 times the amount of dioxins and PCBs (polychlorinated biphenals) normally found in wild salmon.
It suggests this is due to the feeding of fish contaminated with dioxins to salmon on fish farms.
However, Dr Wayne Anderson of the FSAI said 50 per cent of fish meal given to farmed salmon in the State was made in the Republic and preliminary investigations indicated it was monitored for dioxins and PCBs.
Mr Richie Flynn, executive secretary of the Irish Salmon Growers' Association, said consumers should have no worries about the safety of salmon farmed in Ireland. He said a 1998 report from the Marine Institute said fish landed in Ireland were "effectively free of PCBs".