Meat from the offspring of cloned animals could soon be entering Canada's food supply, leading food researchers warn, and consumers may not know they're buying it.
Sylvain Charlebois, director of Dalhousie University's Institute of Agriculture and Food Analysis, told Global News on Saturday that Health Canada will allow meat from the offspring of cloned animals to be sold in the country without labeling or formal risk assessment.
“From a food safety perspective, the science is pretty clear. There's no need to worry at all,” he said. “There's actually been a lot of literature on this issue over the last 25 years. But I think what's really at stake here isn't science. It's really silence.”
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Health Canada launched a consultation in 2024 to gather feedback from Canadians on a proposed approach to food derived from cloned animals and their progeny.
This change would remove cloned animals from the definition of “novel food” and eliminate pre-market safety evaluation and labeling requirements. The agency stressed that it does not participate in cloning activities “now or in the future.”
A sign posted at Health Canada headquarters in Ottawa on January 3, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick.
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In early November, Dubreton, a Quebec-based certified humane and organic pork company, sounded the alarm about the presence of cloned animal meat in Canada's food supply. The company said the regulatory changes will allow stores to sell beef and pork made from cloned animals without safety reviews or mandatory labeling.
Vincent Breton, CEO of duBreton, wrote in a release: “Consumers have the right to decide for themselves. Governments quietly changing the definition of new foods means there is no way to differentiate between brands that support animal cloning and those that do not, unless they are labeled as organic.”
“People want to know that and they have a right to know that.”
Charlebois said many consumers are attracted to low prices, but don't know when a cloned product will be on their doorstep.
“If you give me two meats and one is conventional and one is cloned, you won't be able to tell the difference,” he says. “But if you were offered cloned meat for half the price with a label, which would you choose?”
He said cloned products could ultimately be cheaper for the industry to produce, adding: “Without labelling, how can consumers benefit from these technological advances? That's the real question here.”
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