China: Successfully clone 3 highly productive supercows

Chinese scientists have successfully cloned three "super cows" that can produce an unusually high amount of milk, state media reported, hailing it as a breakthrough for China's dairy industry to reduce its reliance on imported breeds. They were cloned from highly productive cows of the Holstein Friesian breed, originally from the Netherlands. The chosen animals are capable of producing 18 tons of milk per year, or 100 tons of milk in their lifetime. That's nearly 1.7 times the amount of milk produced by the average cow in the United States in 2021, according to the US Department of Agriculture. The first of the cloned calves was born on December 30 by caesarean section due to its relatively large size of 56.7 kilograms (120 pounds), an official from the city of Wulin in Ningxia told the state-run Technology Daily. The scientists created 120 cloned embryos from the ear cells of highly productive cows and placed them in surrogate cows, according to Technology Daily. Jin Yaping, the ...