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China will have a clone factory
Last reviewed: 02.07.2025
The "Clone Factory" will be located in northern China, in a free market zone, and according to preliminary data, construction will cost approximately 500 million dollars.
According to official reports, the factory is being created for the purpose of breeding elite breeds of livestock and horses, as well as service and decorative dogs, especially rare breeds.
The construction of such a factory was initiated by the Boyalife Group corporation and several research institutes, in particular the Korea Institute of Biotechnology.
Boyalife Group Corporation is engaged in research work in the field of stem cells and regenerative medicine, and the company's specialists also provide some types of services as part of the research.
The first stage of construction will cost about $32 million. According to media reports, work on the main building has already begun and it will be commissioned in the middle of next year. The factory will reportedly grow up to 1 million livestock embryos.
Boyalife Group CEO Xu Xiaochun noted in his interview that the market demand for beef is much higher than what farmers can provide, who are trying their best to meet the needs of the population, but this is not always possible, and cloning is the best way out of the current situation.
In addition to growing cloned animals, the factory will also become a repository for genetic information and a museum.
The world's first cloned animal was the world-famous sheep Dolly, almost 20 years have passed since then. The cloned sheep died at a fairly young age - the animal had a malfunctioning circulatory system and many organs began to fail. But since Dolly's death, Chinese scientists have accumulated a lot of experience in asexual reproduction of pigs, cows, sheep, perhaps new clones will be more resistant to life conditions.
This project will not be the first for the Boyalife corporation; in 2014, together with the Korean Institute of Biotechnology, a commercial enterprise for animal cloning was founded; the first clones were 3 Tibetan Mastiff puppies, by the way, a rather rare breed.
The "clone factory" proposes to meet the demand for beef by asexually reproducing animals, while other specialists are working on a 3-D printing method that will allow printing meat without killing living creatures, even cloned ones. According to scientists, enjoying the taste of juicy meat without thinking about the fact that the poor animal suffered will be possible in the next two years.
Scientists have already learned to grow organic muscle cells in the laboratory, which can be used to obtain whole pieces of meat. Several years ago, a burger was grown in a Dutch laboratory and then eaten (according to the data, no scientists were harmed). At that time, the cost of such a “treat” was about 500 thousand dollars, and only recently has the cost of the “burger” decreased.
Israeli specialists have managed to improve the process and, according to the head of the Modern Farming Foundation, the cruel practice of slaughtering animals for meat can be forgotten in just 2 years.