Cloned cow milk exposes industry problems
Aug 3, 2010
Claims across the UK press in recent news that milk from up to 100 cloned cows may have made its way into the British milk market, exposes many issues which affect every single person who drinks milk in the UK.
Read the Daily Mail article >>
Read the official statement from the Food Standards Agency >>
No clarity for consumers
As the story has progressed, it seems the EU Commission confused matters by saying that the Food Standards Agency (FSA) were wrong to include the offspring of cloned animals in their interpretation of the EU laws that cover the sale and consumption of cloned animals.
Simon Pope, WSPA UK’s Head of External Affairs said: “Consumers are being let down by poor labelling and confusing legislation that is seemingly interpreted differently across the EU. The WSPA applauds the FSA’s attempts to limit the exposure of British consumers to food products made from both offspring of and cloned animals themselves.”
Read the Guardian article on legislative confusion over cloned cows >>
Consumer choice removed
The same lack of labelling that makes it impossible for shoppers to know whether they are drinking milk from cloned cows, will take away the nation’s consumer rights in choosing whether to drink factory milk from ‘battery cows’, should applications be approved for ‘mega-dairies’ such as the proposed 8,100 cow farm in Nocton, Lincolnshire.
Read more about the spread of ‘mega-dairies’ in the UK >>
If milk from cloned cows is entering our food chain, then it highlights a lack of transparency within the food industry and the extent to which consumers are increasingly treated as silent partners.
For example, at a time when UK consumers are no longer willing to tolerate battery hens, it seems at odds with public sentiment to suggest placing cows at the heart of an industrial process.
Championing poor welfare?
© Neil Darwent
WSPA opposes all forms of genetic manipulation that (either through breeding or genetic engineering) cause abnormalities, affect the animal’s health or welfare, or result in excessively developed bodily features and physical traits.
The cloned cows that have been all over the UK news recently are a high yielding type of cow used throughout the dairy industry. They have been bred to do one thing well and that is to produce a lot of milk.
However, it comes at the expense of the cow’s own health and this breed of cow is largely sold on and slaughtered far earlier than its more robust cousins. WSPA seriously questions how that can be an attribute worth cloning.
Find out more about WSPA’s campaign against intensive dairy farms and how you can help >>
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