Who got that job?

Were you one of the people who applied for this job and wondered who got it?

Job title: National manager, residues, New Zealand Food Safety Authority.

You're a fairly rare beast if you have the qualifications to apply for this job, which belongs in the animal products group of the newly created New Zealand Food Safety Authority, a semi-autonomous unit of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry.

Mike Clear, 57, with a chemistry degree and jobs with MAF since 1972, is in charge of ensuring legal pesticides and agricultural chemicals don't harm people or the environment.

"They're considered to be toxic, for the most part, or have undesirable influences on humans, so there's a desire to limit exposure. The trick is to find out what those levels are.

"What happens to it when it gets out of its container and into the environment? Where does it go? What happens in the soil, and do they get into water?"

The NZFSA is, among other things, responsible for food safety and for a monitoring and surveillance programme.

A large part of Clear's job, based in Wellington, is management of residue programmes for animal products involving liaison with laboratories and inspectors, who are based in the main at meatworks.

Clear says he has always had an interest in the environment. His first job after graduation was as a research scientist in nuclear physics at the university.

A job in pollution management with the Ministry of Works followed, and his third post sent him to the MAF animal research centre at Wallaceville as an analytical chemist. Clear was previously programme manager for veterinary residue assessments within MAF and has spent more than half of his life involved with residues.