South Korean dog cloning company will reward puppy love ... and writing skills
WHAT are your essay-writing skills like? And how much do you love your dog? Combine the two and you could win a super bizarre prize worth $150,000.
A DOG cloning company has launched a competition to reward a dog-owner with a genetic copy of their beloved booch.
The South Korean firm says it will waive the A$150,000 fee for the person who convinces them in a short essay that their dog is loved so much that it should be able to go walkies forever. The pet can be of any breed or age.
The company has reportedly had success cloning people's beloved pooches all over the world, including Aussie pups.
England's Channel 4, which will follow the process for a documentary, says it will prove a fascinating opportunity to see just how much our dogs mean to us.
But animal welfare groups and leading geneticists have condemned the contest, saying cloning takes a high toll on animal welfare.
The Sooam Biotech Research Foundation, which is running the competition, is headed by Hwang Woo-suk, who in 2005 produced Afghan hound Snuppy, the world's first cloned dog.
Dr Katy Taylor, of the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, said: "Cloning is still a very unpredictable and hugely wasteful process. In attempts to produce one perfect clone, many animals with the same genes as a beloved pet will be born. Some of these will be aborted, or will die soon after birth."
Professor Robin Lovell-Badge, an expert in genetics at the National Institute for Medical Research in London, said owners who expected a carbon copy of their pet were likely to be disappointed, adding: "It's a really daft idea."