The owner of Supermac's has said he is "concerned" about the potential of food shortages in the winter.
Pat McDonagh highlighted the impact that the illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine has had on farmers, businesses and production just hours after it was confirmed that one of his main rivals was hiking up prices.
Cheeseburgers, chicken McNuggets and breakfast items are all going up by between 10 and 20c in McDonald's restaurants around Ireland.
READ MORE: No battle of the burger as Supermac's follows McDonald's with price hikes
And while Supermac's has already brought in a measured increase, there could still be problems ahead.
Speaking to Newstalk's The Hard Shoulder in Portlaoise, Mr McDonagh explained: "Everybody has to get through it, we have to adapt to the new situation and deal with it - and it will level itself out.
"I would be concerned, though, in one sense there could be a little bit of a scarcity of food towards the end of the winter up towards December.
"The way things are with the war in Ukraine, etc it has a massive knock-on effect right across the whole world really."
Mr McDonagh did note that he wasn't making a prediction of any kind, more so his own analysis - though he did urge people to take a couple of steps to protect themselves.
He said: "I would be recommending people to buy a bit of long-life food earlier on. The price of, say, cooking oil has nearly doubled in the last six months because most of it comes from the sunflower in Ukraine.
"That's not being produced in a lot of cases this year... and then the cost of fertiliser, farmers didn't fertilise this year. So I think you'll have a lowering of the food productivity in this country as well for the autumn.
In August 2019, Supermac’s won its battle to force burger giant McDonald’s to relinquish its “big mac” trademark in Europe in what became known as ‘the battle of the burger.’
Supermac's, which owns more than 100 fast food restaurants in Ireland, complained to the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).
READ NEXT:
