or-politics.com
November 24, 2015
China looks set to build the world’s biggest cloning factory, with dogs, cows and horses expected to be replicated amid planned investment of $30 million (200 million yuan). He said cloned animals were already used in China and Afghanistan as drug sniffing dogs.
Its first project saw scientists cloned three pure-blooded Tibetan mastiff puppies – a breed once much sought after by Chinese consumers.
Tianjin is building the world’s largest animal cloning factory, aiming to produce one million cattle embryos annually, state media reported on Monday.
Spokesman from the Tianjin Economic-Technological Development Area yesterday announced they had inked a strategic agreement with Yingke Boya Gene Technology, a Chinese company specialising in stem cell and biomedicine.
A subsidiary of Boyalife, a biotech conglomerate with operations spanning 16 Chinese provinces, will be leading the operation alongside South Korea’s Sooam Bitotech Research Foundation and two other Chinese research institutions.
The factory also plans to set up a cloning lab, a gene bank and a science education centre. The first phase of the project will produce a few 100,000 cattle each year beginning in 2016, Xu said.
Question marks remain over the safety of cloning years after Dolly the sheep was cloned. China’s first commercial animal cloning centre was established in 2014 in the eastern Shandong Province. More and more companies have shown interest in investing in the technology for commercial use, especially animal husbandry. “China has made the impression that we are followers or the copycats, but with cloning we will gradually become a global leader”, he added, apparently missing the irony of launching a cloning center while eschewing the label of “copycat”. According to China Daily, this venture is an animal cloning pioneer, with 550 dogs for special airport security and customs tasks projected to be cloned by the end of 2015.
