Retailers will find out over the next few days if must remove any other non-compliant meat products from their shelves.

Manufacturers and supermarkets are frantically testing all beef containing products, such as burgers, meatballs and lasagne ahead of presenting their findings to the Food Standards Agency (FSA) on February 15.

However, industry insiders claim that the sheer volume of tests to be carried out, and insufficient testing facilities, will render it highly unlikely that any more than 25% of products will have been tested by the deadline.

Over the weekend Aldi was forced to recall all batch codes of its own brand Today’s Special Frozen Beef Lasagne and Today’s Special Frozen Spaghetti Bolognese after horse meat was found in some samples.

The products implicated are from French supplier, Comigel, the company that also supplied Findus. The FSA recommends that any retailers who have sourced beef products from Comigel should conduct a precautionary withdrawal of product.

Last week convenience stores and supermarkets from across the country were forced to remove packs of Findus Beef Lasagne in 320g, 360g and 500g packs from sale after they were found to contain between 60% and 100% horsemeat.

The products, made by a third party supplier, had been been found to contain between 60% and 100% horsemeat.

The controversy surrounding the contamination of meat products has affected manufacturers and retailers in the UK, Irish Republic, Poland and France.

Last month, Irish food inspectors announced they had found horsemeat in some burgers stocked by a number of supermarket chains, including Tesco, Iceland and Lidl.

“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 horsemeat is present,” an FSA spokeswoman said.

“This is a very serious issue. It 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.”

Findus said it was confident that fully compliant beef lasagne would be in stores again soon. Retailers with any queries should call the Findus UK Customer Care Line on UK 0800 132584.