欧盟委员会近日宣布，将在近期就克隆食品提出一项立法建议，建议欧盟在今后5年暂停用于食品生产的动物克隆，不过，仍将允许从美国等地进口用克隆动物后代生产的食品。欧盟委员会负责卫生与消费者事务的一位委员表示，克隆动物食品是安全的，与正常繁殖的动物食品没有什么区别；此次提出暂时禁令只是出于动物福利方面的考虑。他同时指出，克隆动物通过传统方式繁殖的后代用于食品生产和销售不在禁止之列，因为这些产品的源头无法追踪，而且对其实行禁令可能导致国际贸易混乱。
The European Union announced plans on Tuesday to temporarily ban the use of animal cloning for food production, while allowing imports of food derived from the offspring of clones from the United States and elsewhere.
The report from the European Commission followed a call by EU lawmakers in July for a total ban on food derived from cloned animals and their traditionally bred offspring, citing ethical concerns over the industrial production of cloned meat.
The Commission said a temporary five-year EU ban on cloning for food production was justified on animal welfare grounds, but said banning imports of food from the offspring of clones was unnecessary and would disrupt global trade.
"Food from cloned animals is safe. In fact, the scientific opinion is that it cannot be differentiated in any way from food from normally bred animals. The issue is animal welfare," EU Health and Consumer Commissioner John Dalli told reporters.
Food derived from the offspring of clones presents no such animal welfare issues, and banning its sale and import would be impossible because the origin is untraceable, Dalli said.
"Such a prohibition would lead to a ban of imports of any food of animal origin (meat, milk and processed products) from third countries allowing the cloning technique," the report said.
"We're not going to regulate for the world," Dalli added.
But animal welfare groups criticized the Commission's decision, saying it had bowed to pressure from third countries.
"We do not accept the Commission's position that it would be impossible to enforce a ban that includes the offspring of cloned animals, as (other) meat traceability systems are already in place," said Sonja Van Tichelen, director of the Eurogroup for Animals. |