The Realities of Cloning

Mark Kastel

"The arrogance of some in corporate agribusiness will likely, once again, drive consumers to purchase organic food, the last bastion of authenticity in the human food chain."

"Just as in the dairy industry's adoption of genetically engineered bovine growth hormone (rBGH/rBST), if the meat industry circles the wagons they will drive consumers to the natural food cooperatives and grocers stocking organic meat."

"The National Organic Program at the USDA, responsible for oversight of the organic industry, made it very clear that cloned animals, and their progeny, are strictly banned from organic livestock production."

"Consumers concerned about experiments with their food supply or humane treatment of livestock are very uncomfortable with cloning technology." A recent opinion poll conducted by the Food Information Council found that 58 per cent of Americans surveyed would be unlikely to buy meat or milk from cloned animals, even if supported by FDA safety endorsements.

The realities of cloning include some disturbing phenomena:

* 64% of cattle, 40% of sheep, and 93% of cloned mice exhibit some form of abnormality, with a large percentage of the animals dying during gestation or shortly after birth
* High rates of late abortion and early prenatal death, with failure rates of 95% to 97% in most mammal cloning attempts
* Defects such as grossly oversized calves, enlarged tongues,
squashed faces, intestinal blockages, immune deficiencies, and diabetes
* When cloning does not produce a normal animal, many of the
difficult pregnancies cause physical suffering or death to the
surrogate mothers

Regardless of what the proponents claim this is all about bottom-line profit and producing more and more of our food from giant industrial-scale farming operations. We are getting so, so far away from Farmer Jones and the intimate connection between the land, animals, and the people who care for them in a sustainable and
regenerative system. I wish I could say this was science fiction"

Widespread adoption of cloning could lead to the dramatic loss of genetic diversity in livestock. "This may leave farmers and our nation's food supply susceptible to devastating epidemics due to a monoculture gene pool—think the Irish potato famine."