Cloning Livestock

In “The Other Other White Meat”, Ben Paynter explores the use of cloning in the livestock industry. Despite having a clichéd title that barely makes sense, the article gives an insightful look into the many sides of the cloning issue. Cow and pig breeders have turned to cloning in an effort to make their animals the best they can be. Cloning allows the breeders take an animal with particularly desirable traits and produce an offspring that carries all of these traits. Traditional breeding and artificial insemination do not guarantee that the offspring will take on the traits that made their parents so valuable. This is why breeders are willing to pay more than ten times as much to have their animals cloned.

Although there has been to evidence to show that cloned meat or milk is any different, many still argue that products from cloned animals should not be allowed in stores. Currently the FDA has banned cloned meat from supermarket shelves. This is largely because no long term generational studies on cloned meat have been finished. Several of the breeders Paynter visited, however, all felt safe enough with the cloned meat that they would eat it themselves. Should the FDA reconsider its policies? I think that we will eventually find out that cloned meat is just as safe as regular meat, but until then the FDA should adopt some policy to deal with this issue. Stickers that tell the consumer they are eating cloned meat would be a good idea because this would support the cloning industry and warn those who are wary of cloning. An important aspect to consider, however, would be the impact that cloning would have on the livestock industry. Would it push it towards an even more harmful industrial state? Or would it push it towards a more high tech industry with smaller more environmentally friendly farms?