GE carrots could clobber possums

Genetically engineered carrots and potatoes are the latest weapon in the war against possums.

The Environmental Risk Management Authority (Erma) has approved an application from Landcare Research to import the modified vegetables from Australia and the United States.

Testing will be carried out at Lincoln in Canterbury to see if the carrots and potatoes trigger sterility in possums. The technology involves inserting a vaccine protein called an antigen.

The Sydney-based director of the Marsupial Cooperative Research Centre, John Rodger, said the testing would be restricted to a laboratory and it might be five to 10 years before scientists could look at large-scale field trials.



Genetically engineered carrots were chosen because there was no chance of their regenerating in the wild.



Dr Rodger said the outcome of the Royal Commission into Genetic Modification in the next few months would be an important factor in whether genetic engineering could be used against possums.

The $4.8 million commission, headed by former chief justice Sir Thomas Eichelbaum, is due to report to the Government in June, but the moratorium on field trials - those outside laboratories - and general releases will continue for a further three months while the Government decides what to do with the recommendations.

Scientists on both sides of the Tasman have questioned whether possums could develop resistance to genetically engineered biological controls.

But this week a transtasman group of scientists specialising in marsupials said that was unlikely.



"Possums are unlikely to inherit any significant resistance to fertility control," said Phil Cowan of Landcare, director of the marsupial research.



The technology was likely to be effective in the long term.

New Zealand scientists are looking at a range of delivery mechanisms for immuno-contraceptives apart from baits such as carrots.

The options range from incorporating them in plants that possums eat in the wild and even to aerosol sprays delivered when dominant possums feed at a bait station.

Dr Cowan said large-scale production of edible vaccines was made possible by inserting genes for the appropriate vaccine protein into a plant.

Possums, an Australian native, wreak havoc in New Zealand by damaging forests, preying on and competing with native birds for food, and infecting cattle and deer with bovine tuberculosis.

Control of the pest is costing New Zealand between $80 million and $100 million a year, and some specialists have said conventional controls using air drops of poisoned baits, trapping and shooting will never eradicate possums.

* AgResearch's Ruakura Research Centre suffered a petrol-bomb attack yesterday as the royal commission prepared to hear submissions at a hui.





Fire Service spokesman Ken McKegg said the attack, at about 4 am, burned a 20m stretch of grass along a fenceline beside the East Coast main trunk railway line.

Two Molotov cocktails were found at the scene.

A nearby shed was defaced with the words: "No GE. Stop the tests."

Centre spokesman Mike King said the fire was at the deer-handling facility. No deer were involved in genetic work.

Hamilton East police refused to comment on the incident.

The organiser of the commission's consultation meetings with Maori, Mike McMillan, was unaware of the attack and said it could be coincidence.

The three-day hui started at Turangawaewae Marae in Ngaruawahia yesterday and is the last of 10 on the genetic engineering issue being held throughout the country.

The commission will hear submissions today.

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