The company, providing employment to over 10,500 people across 13 processing facilities in Northern Ireland, England, France and Holland, has delivered a sales uplift of 16.4 per cent against the previous year.

Margins for the year were impacted by unprecedented levels of inflation which significantly increased feed and other raw material costs. Despite this, Moy Park continued to deliver a positive operating profit of £7.4 million and pre-tax profit of £4.8 million.

Commenting on the results Moy Park Chief Executive, Nigel Dunlop said: "Exceeding £1 billion in sales revenues is a landmark achievement for Moy Park. We have continued to deliver a positive financial performance in the face of difficult trading conditions and are committed to building a strong and sustainable future for the business, further cementing our position as Northern Ireland's leading food company."

Speaking about the challenges facing the food processing sector, Mr Dunlop continued: "Increasing inflation costs is the greatest challenge we face. Moy Park continues to work closely with our customers to mitigate the impact of these costs on the business. Despite the ongoing challenge to overcome feed price and other inflation, we have continued to invest in our business and our brands to meet the current and future needs of our customers and consumers.

"In 2011, we invested £32 million in capital expenditure bringing the total investment in the business over the last four years to £106 million. By investing in our industry-leading farming base and our manufacturing facilities we believe we can continue to improve efficiencies further while increasing capacity to meet future customer requirements."

Moy Park is part of global food company, Marfrig. As well as supplying high quality poultry products to major retailers and foodservice companies throughout the UK, Ireland and Europe, Moy Park has invested heavily in its own brand and has plans to introduce Marfrig's international Seara brand into the UK this year. Moy Park is now the number one poultry brand in Ireland with over 869,000 Irish households buying the brand, representing a penetration of over 53 per cent.

Corporate responsibility and high animal welfare standards remain at the heart of the business explained Mr Dunlop. He said: "Moy Park is committed to continually developing our Corporate Responsibility activities to focus on making our business even better, more sustainable and environmentally friendly.

"Our achievements as a business in these important areas have been highlighted with recognition and awards in workplace and employment practices, the agricultural supply chain, environmental performance, sustainable best practice and manufacturing excellence all made possible by a great team of people across the business" Mr Dunlop concluded.