Officials hack into AgResearch GE application

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Agriculture officials who ensure researchers comply with conditions placed on approvals for genetically engineered organisms tore strips off AgResearch's wide-ranging applications for genetic engineering experiments in the run-up to producing GE livestock.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF) told regulators it was concerned by the "very generic nature" of the AgResearch applications "particularly around the paucity of information related to the techniques which will be used".

It noted the state's biggest science company was seeking to use any technique, "including novel techniques not yet developed".

There was a degree of risk associated with granting the researchers a free hand "to develop transgenic animals using unknown biotechnology", particularly where the risks of that methodology had not been assessed.

Environmental Risk Management Authority (Erma) staff today said they were recommending that the applications be rejected, and AgResearch quickly announced it would trim the number of species for which it was seeking approval.

It originally sought approval for strains of E. coli bacteria, yeast, cells from humans and African green monkeys, and animals from the broad family groups including cattle, water buffalo, sheep, goats, pigs, horses, llamas, deer, rats, mice, hamsters, guinea pigs, possums, chickens and rabbits.

MAF said the generic range of organisms was a worry - partly because some of those families of animals included species protected under international treaties - and it called for micro-organisms to be restricted to "noninfectious" strains.

MAF also complained that the applications were contradictory, because the applications said no product from transgenic animals would leave containment other than for disposal, but also said viable GE product would be permitted to be exported or processed outside containment, or sent to other MAF-registered containment sites.

And when AgResearch claimed that GE human cells and E. coli bacteria it used would be those previously approved by Erma, MAF warned that this would limit the scope of imports only to specific organisms containing that genetic engineering.

AgResearch claims that it would know the functions encoded in the pieces of DNA it engineered were questioned by MAF, which how the functions of the new genetic constructs could be "extensively validated" in mammal cell cultures in the laboratory were also questioned.

AgResearch was "a little misleading" in implying that the coding functions of any DNA it used would be known, the ministry said: "MAF does not believe that this is the case at all".

Erma said in an evaluation and review report released today that it received 1724 submissions, of which 1122 were based on form letters.

The Department of Conservation made only a one-paragraph comment that it did not oppose the applications, though it had concerns over the wide range of animals covered.

"We are confident that the authority will take into account all associated risks," it said.

- NZPA