Europe shuns labels for cloned food

BRUSSELS, March 30 (UPI) -- Members of the European Union refused to follow parliamentary demands calling for labels to identify food from the offspring of cloned animals, Parliament said.

"Meat from the offspring of cloned animals could find its way onto the EU market, with no one being any the wiser, after member state representatives refused the Parliament's demand to label clone-derived products," the European Parliament said in a statement.

The European Parliament wanted to reach a compromise bill after public opinion surveys indicated most people in the EU didn't want to buy food from cloned animals.

There are no rules in the EU that ban dairy or meat products from cloned animals.

Edinburgh University's Ian Wilmut, the scientist who created the first cloned animal, Dolly the sheep, in 1996, told the EUobserver that introducing cloned animals into the food chain didn't make sense.

"If you were making cloned animals to make a genetic change to produce a protein that could treat human disease, that might be ethically acceptable," he said. "On the other hand, if you were producing more meat, or slightly better quality meat, the advantage would not be very great."