The council said that while biotech may be able to offer “marginal benefits” in cutting greenhouse gases and tackling other environmental impacts of livestock farming, it will not make a substantial difference in the absence of wider changes to food and farming systems, and probably a reduction in meat and dairy demand.
At present, genome editing – which allows for precise engineering of the genetic makeup of organisms – remains at the research stage for livestock animals such as chickens, pigs, and cattle.
The Nuffield Council on Bioethics listed potential benefits such as reducing disease in livestock populations, marking male chicks so they can be disposed of as eggs rather than killed as chicks, or producing hornless cattle that do not need to be “dehorned” for safety reasons.
However, it raised the issue of genome editing being used to bolster unethical farming practices that worsens animal welfare, such as battery farming, or to engineer animals...