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From the July/August issue Organic New Zealand (www.organicnz.org)
Q: When is a field containment facility for holding GM-livestock no longer capable of effective containment?
A: After you’ve made many big holes in it!
That’s at least one answer … but you will be very unlikely to find any holes in the Ruakura security fence! The highly touted double-perimeter electrified fence of Ruakura’s GM-livestock field containment facility has by all reported accounts remained intact while holding their GM-cattle. However, the same cannot be claimed with any measure of confidence when it comes to containment of the transgenes and gene products themselves. Understandably, the transgenic-DNA, purposefully engineered as a cellular genetic component of the GM-cattle, remains in existence even after each animal’s death. In this case, the double-perimeter fence has been an irrelevant security structure from the outset, as it is clearly unable to prevent the physical movement of transgenic-DNA through the natural boundaries of the field containment facility (FCF) into the surrounding unregulated soil environment The answer to the above conundrum is a direct reference to the increasing number of two-metre deep pits that have been deliberately and repeatedly excavated over the past ten years inside the containment facility. Curiously, and in both ERMA-speak and AgResearch-speak, these holes are still euphemistically referred to as ‘offal holes’. ‘Offal holes’ is an absurdly misleading term for these soil structures that are deep, unlined, open-air pits, constructed to have sufficient working capacity to periodically receive and accommodate whole carcasses (up to perhaps a tonne at a time!) from expected GM-cattle mortality. As open field installations, these ‘offal holes’ or burial pits, whether active (a few) or abandoned (quite a lot), are naturally exposed to all seasonal extremes of climate, particularly rainfall, throughout each and every season. Some of the ‘offal holes’, with their slowly liquefying and decomposing contents, have experienced almost ten complete seasons of ‘in-soil residence’. Irrespective of whether ERMA initially classified AgResearch’s applications as either F for field trial (i.e. GMF 98009) or D for development (i.e. GMD02028), field management of these projects has specifically required the GM-cattle to be confined in Ruakura’s field containment facility. This field facility is now reported to be holding 96 GM-cattle, mostly GM-dairy cows, being the livestock products of Ruakura’s on-going attempts to develop a transgenic dairy herd. So, as termination of the above transgenic-cattle projects draws closer, what are we to now make of AgResearch’s quite recent presentation in February 20081 that it is preparing to launch a suite of applications covering four new GM-animal development programmes? As announced, AgResearch expressed its intentions for two of these new GM-animal programmes to be conducted under field containment conditions. While both AgResearch and ERMA, to date, have been reluctant to release more details of any formal applications, it is clearly obvious that these recent AgResearch initiatives strongly suggest construction of at least one and possibly more additional field containment facilities at unspecified locations in New Zealand. Their research projections do not preclude consideration of transporting GM-animals between such field facilities. A simple on-line re-examination of ERMA Decisions2 of AgResearch’s original applications GMF 98009 (Parts 1 and 2) and GMD 02028, together with AgResearch’s mandatory annual reports to ERMA3 can provide even the casual inquirer with sufficient clues to conclude that up to this point in time ERMA has chosen to be selective in applying its key statutory responsibility under the HSNO Act solely in terms of containment, while AgResearch has clearly continued to perceive its GM-research ventures of primarily engineering GM-animals as development of transgenic biological factories. But to date neither body, either jointly or separately, has displayed any convincingly serious scientific direction of research, or acknowledged any responsibility, to develop scientific strategies for evaluation of the actual environmental risks and safety of the existing GM-hotspots known as ‘offal holes’ ... each one now likely to contain many tonnes of GM-animal tissues at varying stages of in-soil liquefaction and decomposition. Importantly, it is the inevitable consequence of there being both abandoned and active unlined soil-burial pits, plentifully stocked with decomposing GM-animal parts in direct and continuing contact with the soil environment that surely further erodes any credibility that the existing Ruakura field facility now has any significant capacity (if it ever did) of retaining the transgenes or their genetic products. As a unit, the field containment facility may well be at, or even beyond, its ‘best by date’. Site management may genuinely be wondering where to excavate the next ‘offal hole’. Even if total and immediate closure of the Ruakura field containment facility in its current state were to be implemented, major unknowns about the natural physical and biological events that govern the fate of animal-transgenes deliberately buried under such conditions are likely to remain unanswered far into the future. This may be what the ‘business as usual’ ethos might willingly wish to dictate, but that is simply not good enough!
So … why would anyone formally approve construction of any GM-animal containment field facility elsewhere in New Zealand, with ERMA issuing instructions to its field managers to run it in a similar manner to the present Ruakura facility? As for Ruakura’s present GM-animal field containment facility, it now poses a significant environmental threat in terms of GM-offal holes. Justifiably, it should be closed and the site officially and indefinitely excluded from livestock farming of any kind into the foreseeable future.
Dr A Neil Macgregor, 11 April 2008.
Full bio http://www.psgr.org.nz/index.php/biographies/18-trustees/27-a-neil-macgregor
References:
1 < www.agresearch.co.nz/transgenic/transgenic-hui-slideshow.pdf >
2 < http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/search/registers.html >
3 < http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/no/compliance/agresearch.html >
What ONZ readers can do …
** Check out these websites.
1 < http://www.agresearch.co.nz/transgenic/transgenic-hui-slideshow.pdf >
2 < http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/search/registers.html > and enter the ERMA Application number you’re interested in.
3 < http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/no/compliance/agresearch.html >
** Check out GE Animal Watch on http://www.psgr.org.nz for updates and developments.
**Anyone can make a submission when AgResearch makes an application to ERMA.
Monitor Applications open for submission on < http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/consultations/consult-apps.html >
See how to make a submission on < http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/consultations/howsubmission.html >. Ends
Who is experimenting with GE animals in New Zealand?
Since 1999, scientists at AgResearch’s campus at Ruakura, Hamilton, have created genetically engineered cattle with the purpose of developing a herd of transgenic dairy cows. The aim of this particular research programme has been to engineer the genetic modification of cattle to produce milk-products that AgResearch repeatedly claims are able to improve human health and nutrition. After almost ten years of research, these claims remain totally unsubstantiated.
What is AgResearch?
AgResearch Limited is an independent, Crown-owned research and development company. The Minister of Finance and the Minister of Crown Research Institutes are its shareholders. It comprises three science groups, a commercial services group and has business units which deal with corporate governance and services.
After-tax revenue for the year 2006-2007 for AgResearch and its subsidiaries was NZ$5.1 million. AgResearch has campuses throughout New Zealand.
Want to know more?
Check out AgResearch at www.agresearch.co.nz
What does AgResearch do?
AgResearch news
Slideshow (pdf)
AgResearch BioPortfolio
Does AgReserach need permission to experiment with GE?
Any enterprise that wants to experiment with genetic engineering technology or use genetically engineered organisms in New Zealand - in confinement, in field trials or in the environment - has to make an application to the Environmental Resource Management Authority (ERMA).
ERMA considers each application, the science submitted in support of it, and its implications for New Zealand. To date, because ERMA has refused to take into account relevant scientific objections offered at every hearing, no formal application seeking ERMA Authority approval to use transgenic has ever been denied. Submissions are invited on each application to ERMA. Anyone can monitor applications and make a submission in support or against any application.
Monitor Applications here.
How to make a submission.
What applications have been made?
AgResearch Application GMF98009
AgResearch Application GMD02028 |
Reply from Acting Minister for the Environment 31 Oct 07