01/31/07 Hearing on cloning and food labeling

Washington Ag January 31, 2007 A bill that would require all food and food products sold in Washington that are derived from cloned animals to be labeled as such got a hearing in the Senate Agriculture and Rural Development Committee Tuesday. Senate Bill 5161 was sponsored by Seattle Democrat Ken Jacobsen who sees it as a consumer right to know issue. The Washington State Farm Bureau opposes the labeling proposal and was represented at the hearing by Patrick Connor. Connor: "Most consumers will likely never eat a cloned animal. Rather milk and meat products in the marketplace will come from the offspring of cloned animals. Those clones will primarily be used as breeding stock in order to improve the health and quality of animals used for food production." Connor also mentioned a recent draft risk assessment of animal cloning from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Connor: "Have determined that meat and milk from cloned animals and their offspring are in fact safe for human consumption and are no different from foods produced from other breeding methods." Connor said a label would appear to be a warning to consumers when no warning is necessary. Representatives of the grocer and retail industry weren't outright opposed to a cloned label requirement but said they would prefer federal guidelines on the issue and at least currently have no way to identify an animal to determine how it was produced. I'm Bob Hoff.