84 ice cream van drivers employed by the Unilever company are to lose their jobs.
The drivers, who deliver HB ice cream and frozen food products, are based at various locations around the country.
The largest job losses will be in Roscommon, Cork and Limerick with smaller numbers being laid off in Kilkenny, Wexford, Dundalk and Tullamore and the company's Dublin head office.
Unilever, which has a total workforce of over 600 people, says the redundancies are part of a rationalisation plan which will transfer distribution from its internal van sales fleet to independent local distributors. The company says it hopes a significant number of new jobs will be created in the new distribution network.
The changes will be phased in over the next 12 months. Unilever said it was no longer economically viable to maintain a national distribution fleet.
