Animal Cloning: a full ban is needed

The European Parliament today endorsed a draft EU Directive on a ban on animal cloning. MEPs support a fully-fledged ban which also applies to animal products and imports. "Cloning is torture for animals. The mortality rate is 90% and most cloned animals have deficiencies of various kinds", said Renate Sommer MEP who is the European Parliament Rapporteur.

Most consumers oppose animal cloning and would not buy foodstuffs from cloned animals. "77% of EU citizens believe that animal cloning is going to pave the way to human cloning. They have a point as any reproduction technique which has been developed for farming purposes has, in the end, also applied to human medicine", said the EPP Group MEP.

"Cloning is also about ethics and politicians need to set a limit. We cannot restrict legislation to cloning as such and imports of cloned animals. We must also ban any material stemming from cloned animals including the descendants of cloned animals. This is why the European Parliament calls for a traceability system which would ensure maximum transparency", said Sommer.

"Today's vote is a clear signal to the Council. Ministers must get their act together and reach a common position so that we can start negotiations on the final wording of the EU ban as soon as possible", concluded the European Parliament Rapporteur.