Large scale animal cloning unlikely: scientists

By Michael Kahn

LONDON (Reuters) - Cloning animals will not be useful on a large scale but the technology offers farmers an important tool to increase food production and protect animals from disease, scientists said on Tuesday.

Critics contend that not enough is known about cloning to make it safe, while advocates say it can improve the quality of meat and dairy products.

Scientists at a briefing to address the intense debate said the technology was just the next step in artificial breeding and would only ever account for a small part of food production.

"Cloning is never going to be a large scale breeding system," Simon Best, chairman of the UK-based BioIndustry Association, told reporters. "It has niche applications."

Cloning involves taking cell nuclei from adults and fusing them into egg cells that are implanted into a surrogate mother.

Scientists said some uses could be to clone animals that are less resistant to certain diseases or to reproduce "elite" livestock that can churn out more milk or produce healthier offspring.

Keith Campbell, a researcher at the University of Nottingham, compared cloning to artificial insemination -- which the scientists noted was used to breed the cows that produce around 75 percent of milk.

Cloning can also help protect rare or dying breeds, said Campbell, who helped work on cloning the first adult mammal, Dolly the sheep.