Recently, a news report by the British media about cloned beef and milk entering the market caused a huge uproar in the UK, and the safety of applying high technology to food has attracted widespread public attention.文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
Cloned food, organic food, and genetically modified food have successively appeared on dining tables. This sounds like a plot from a science fiction novel, but with the rapid development of technology, these scenarios have become reality.文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
Can cloned food be eaten?文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
Since the birth of Dolly the sheep, the first cloned sheep, in the UK in 1996, cloning technology has no longer been unfamiliar to us.文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
It was not until the UK exposed the news of cloned beef appearing on dining tables that the public became aware of the safety of cloned food.文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
Netizen Wenzhu told reporters: “I wouldn't dare eat it. I feel there are many uncertain factors, and there's too much human intervention. I don't like it. What if there's some gene mutation that harms the body?” White-collar worker Peng Jin held the opposite attitude. She told reporters: “If it really exists, I'd dare to eat it too, just to try something new. But it also depends on what the specific product is.”文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
The attitudes of many netizens and Shenyang citizens also reflect the current focus of debate over cloned food: Can it be eaten or not? Regarding this issue, reporters interviewed Professor Luo Guangbin from the College of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine at Shenyang Agricultural University. Professor Luo told reporters: “Cloned beef is simply made by extracting a single cell from a cow, using artificial methods to cultivate it into an embryo, then implanting the embryo into the uterus of a cow to conceive a new individual. Its genes are the same as normal beef; it is just reproduced asexually and is no different from ordinary beef. As a food, it poses no danger to life.”文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
On the second day after the British media report was broadcast, reporters conducted concentrated visits to large supermarkets in Shenyang such as Tesco and Vanguard, as well as some farmers“ markets, and found that many beef vendors expressed opposition to cloned beef appearing on dining tables. Ms. Zhang, who runs a beef business at a farmers” market near Ningshan Road in Huanggu District, Shenyang, told reporters: "If there really is cloned beef, I wouldn't stock it, because there is no news now saying cloned beef is problem-free. It's only some experts introducing that it can be eaten. I must be responsible to consumers."文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
During interviews, reporters learned that the beef sold in major supermarkets in Shenyang currently comes from well-known meat enterprises such as Lufeng and Haoyue. When reporters asked whether cloned beef would be put on shelves if it appeared domestically, a staff member decisively told reporters that they would not do so. According to industry insiders, at present, China's cloned beef and some cloned products are still in the research stage. Only a few scientific research teams are able to carry out cloning, and achieving industrialization and entering the market still requires time.文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
Regarding the safety of cloned food, China has not yet issued relevant standards. When leaders of relevant departments meet, they mention the issue of standards, but there is still a distance before formal discussion. Some experts have stated: no food safety risks have been found in cloned products so far. As long as the animal itself is healthy, the milk it produces should also be healthy. Zhang Sining, associate researcher at the Liaoning Academy of Social Sciences, believes that since the appearance of cloned beef in the UK market has triggered panic among ordinary people, the government should, through extensive research, introduce relevant supporting regulations as soon as possible to fill the gap in this field.文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/
[Source: Huashang Morning Post]文章源自FOFCC-http://fofcc.org.cn/am/11249/