European parliament calls for ban on cloned farm animals

The European parliament urged the EU's executive branch to ban the cloning of animals for the food trade, citing reduced genetic diversity among other concerns.

 Several expert groups, including the
European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Group on
Ethics in Science and New Technologies, outlined problems such as the
animals' well-being and the higher mortality rate of cloned animals.

They also stressed that cloning coould
considerably reduce the gene pool diversity and increase the risk of
whole herds being hit by an illness they are all particularly
susceptible to.