Irish Farmers' Association President John Bryan has said the Food Safety Authority of Ireland had handled the horse DNA controversy badly.
He said its initial statement on the matter was misleading.
Mr Bryan said he wants the pace of the investigation into beef burgers to quicken and he compared it with the pork dioxin crisis which he said was sorted out in three to four days.
He said there has already been a big recall of burgers from Silvercrest and it was time to sort out the crisis as we can not afford to damage Irish jobs.
Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Pat Kenny, Mr Bryan said the traces of horse DNA found in all but one of the burger tests were negligible.
The IFA president said it would have been more accurate to say that just one of the burgers tested - the one in which horse DNA made up 29% of the meat content - had come back positive.
"The initial statement from the Food Safety Authority of Ireland was misleading, it highlighted trace elements that nowhere else in Ireland would have been mentioned and even mentioned there might be a problem with some religious minorities with this.
"So they were exceptionally broad in the statement, without proper facts.
"I think that they should have re-checked their samples, they should have used as all scientific people do a base line in other countries to see what the view in other countries was, without issuing a statement," he said.
Mr Bryan said he is concerned about jobs, adding that the controversy had already cost Silvercrest its Burger King contract.
Earlier, Fianna Fáil's Éamon Ó Cuív said Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney should go before the Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture to explain what he does know about horse meet ending up in beef burgers produced in Ireland.
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, he said: "If there are certain facts that have not yet been established, well we need to know what they are, why they are not established and when they'll be established.
Mr Ó Cuív said the minister should tell them what he does know.
He said despite earlier claims that the source of the horse meat was abroad, that is not clear anymore.
Meanwhile, Mr Coveney has said he will not be releasing further test results on Irish produced beef products until they have been quantified.
He defended the testing process and said his team has been working 16-18 hour days on the matter.
Speaking on Today with Pat Kenny, he said: "I've put them under huge pressure because there is a real need to get this issue over with as soon as possible so that we can get back to rebuilding the reputation of a fantastic food industry."
He also said he can see why Burger King has cancelled its orders for burgers produced here.
"One, because the factory is now closed, so they couldn't get product from the factory even if they wanted to, but also they want to make sure that we get to the bottom, and they get to the bottom, of this investigation before they start supplying again.
"But can I also say, Burger King, and people have ignored this, in their statement said, that they do want to source beef from Britain and Ireland if they can because they recognise the standards here."
Investigators are currently piecing together results from tests carried out on ingredients used in burgers produced between 4 and 16 January, in an effort to trace the source of horse DNA found in beef burgers.
The minister said the results are being quantified at laboratories in Germany and Ireland and "that takes time".
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