On the eve of a seminar on 'New initiatives to Improve Science in New Zealand’ AgResearch has launched an appeal to the recent High Court decision against the National interest.
It is a travesty that public money will be used to fund the appeal against the High Court ruling which invalidated four applications for indefinite, nation-wide commercialisation of GE animals.
“GE Free NZ believes that Justice Clifford’s wrote a robust and measured decision” said Claire Bleakley president of GE Free NZ in food and environment “The HSNO* Act guidelines are very specific as to what is to be in an application and we believe that the precedent setting High Court decision will be upheld.”
The public have made it clear that extreme science of genetic engineering of animals, with the associated abuse and deformities, is simply unacceptable in a modern democratic society with an economy reliant on food exports and our clean-green natural image.
Recent surveys show some 70% of New Zealanders are strongly against the GE animals being proposed by AgResearch in partnership with its overseas biotechnology investors.
Just last week the NZ Herald (Business: B1, 25 June) reported MAF have released a discussion paper signalling the huge opportunity for New Zealand as a world leader in "high-quality sustainably produced meat, rewarding farmers for meeting consumer expectations, in both traditional and new markets".
"The vision outlined in the GE animal applications is simply madness", says Jon Carapiet from GE Free NZ in food and environment. "An approval of the enormous range of things being sought, including the right to import GE embryos from other countries, instigate GE animal production anywhere, anytime, and even using novel GE techniques yet to be invented, is tantamount to economic suicide for Brand New Zealand".
The notice of appeal highlights the core of the argument that has pitched independent scientists, farmers and the public against the vested interests of biotechnology entrepreneurs who are keen to undermine and exploit New Zealand sovereign law, but unwilling to find a middle path of ethical applications of biotechnology such as gene-marker assisted breeding (MAB) and use of recombinant vat fermentation technology in full laboratory containment.
The sly attempt by the applicants to undermine the HSNO*Act and establish a National Protocol that might benefit a handful of biotechnology investors, is an unprecedented betrayal of statutory protections.
The prospect of using genetically engineered food animals as 'bio-reactors' is a direct attack on the recommendations of the Royal Commission on GM, and would have been the subject of a comprehensive audit by the BioEthics Council had it not just been abolished by the National-led government.
