KEY POINTS:
Meat and milk from cloned animals or their offspring are safe to eat, food safety officials say.
The Food Safety Authority has told the Government there is no accepted scientific evidence to suggest food from cloned animals is any less safe than meat or milk from conventionally bred
animals.
"They are safe - there is no real difference between the non-cloned and the cloned animals," policy director Carole Inkster said yesterday. Details of the authority ruling - which have just been published on its website - are expected to stir debate over whether the public will buy lamb, beef or dairy produce from clones or their offspring.
Farmers can make clones, or genetic "twins" of donor animals, by having a lab take cells from an adult and fuse them with other cells for implantation in a surrogate mother.
This allows animals with high genetic quality or monetary value to be "copied", such as when a bull turns out to be a top dairy sire.
The process has been used in New Zealand by AgResearch to save a breeding line of rare cattle from Enderby Island in the sub-Antarctic.
Cloned animals are expensive to produce, but their offspring can be mated with conventional animals to produce sought-after characteristics carried by the "parent" clone, such as increased meat or milk production.
The authority has advised the Government there is no need for specific regulation of food from cloned animals or their offspring, because it will be subject to the same food safety rules as existing meat and dairy produce - the key being the health of the animals.
Ms Inkster said the authority had not made a comparative study of animal welfare issues in cloning, such as the birth difficulties experienced by cloned and conventional animals.
"It hasn't come up as an issue for us," she said.
The authority advice was given to the Government before the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last month declared food from cloned livestock safe for human consumption.
But the FDA has asked American farmers not to sell products into the food supply until after it takes public submissions on whether those products should be allowed to be sold without special labelling.
State legislation has already been introduced in California to require clear labels on all products from cloned animals.
The comment period is due to end in April, after which a final assessment report will be released in the US.
Ms Inkster said there had been an independent scientific investigation here - a review of scientific papers published on food safety aspects of cloned animals - similar to the one carried out by the FDA.
"They cite NZ [scientific] literature," she said.
- NZPA
