by Expat Chef
Lately, I’ve had the urge to hug not a tree, but my freezer. You see, stashed inside this unimpressive white box is meat. Real meat that came from animals that made more real meat in the way that animals do. As opposed to, say, strands of DNA being inserted into an egg in a laboratory somewhere.
I’ve stayed calm and quiet on the whole cloned animal thing, since it looked as if common sense would prevail and cloning would not. I guess I should know better than to under, or rather, overestimate the FDA. So here we are with cloned meat being approved. No labeling required as yet, either.
Now, the no labeling thing is not a shock. Big Dairy and Monsanto are currently waging state-by-state war against “no growth hormone” labeling. Thus, not having cloned meat or milk labels either is par for the course. Indeed, It’s been status quo to keep consumers pretty much in the dark about the origin of our food, even though we know where our TVs, blenders and (non-edible) underwear were made. In fact, we probably DO know where our edible underwear came from, which would be one of the few edible items we can buy that are labeled. If you’re into that kind of thing. Which I'm not.
The overwhelming question in my mind is “Why?” As in, “why cloning?” It’s simply not necessary. Animals have not had any trouble breeding on their own (except for commercial turkeys which is a good lesson here), and farmers have managed selective breeding for some time with artificial insemination. Why turn to an expensive process that has a high fetal mortality rate and can cause issues for the surrogate mother?
Another “why” is why hasn’t the industry embraced this new technology either? Likely because of consumer disgust with the concept, also because of the lack of approval for it on the international level which would limit the sale of the products to U.S.-only. It’s very odd to find myself on the same side of an issue, for differing reasons, with Big Ag. But cloning is just that kind of issue.
The only beneficiaries I can identify would be the biotech companies and those who hold the “patents” on “desirable” genetic material, which further removes the idea of an animal being an actual sentient and natural being toward being just a “product.”
Regardless of the mechanism, limiting the gene pool is never a good idea. Since 1900, we’ve lost 75 percent of the diversity of our food plants. Some GMO varieties threaten that remaining diversity. Additionally, farmers whose neighboring crops were cross-pollinated by GMO crops have been sued for “planting” a patented seed. Livestock diversity has been equally decimated effectively without the “help” of cloning. Many breeds of livestock raised in industrial agriculture can neither breed or survive outside of the factory farm environment.
Diversity is one of nature’s defenses to survive great changes in the environment. Changes such as the ones our planet will experience with global warming. Why should we put our own survival at risk by willfully eradicating some of the very genetics that could help us all survive the changes?
