KEY POINTS:
The nation's biosecurity system of checking seed imports at the border is being manipulated, says a former secretary of the Justice Department.
David Oughton, who was called in to run an inquiry into how two consignments of seed contaminated with genetically engineered seed entered the country late last year, said yesterday the manipulations were not from any ulterior motive "but merely to clear the records".
He said biosecurity computer records showed 30 corn consignments during the past 12 months with incomplete records.
In one case, a consignment of seed corn was stopped at the border and destroyed.
To stop it continuing to appear in the records as still awaiting action "the computer record was manipulated to record all the documentation as conforming", Mr Oughton said.
"That type of action puts into question any attempt to use the computer records to produce accurate information on what has happened," he said.
It played havoc with the collection of statistics and created an audit trail problem.
Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry director-general Murray Sherwin commissioned Mr Oughton to find out how contaminated seed was incorrectly cleared by MAF in October and November 2006.
Imports of up to 4420kg of contaminated sweetcorn seed were investigated: about two-thirds of the seed, 3067.5kg, was planted in Hawkes Bay, Gisborne, and Ashburton, and the remaining 1352.5kg of unplanted seed was recovered. All the plants grown from contaminated seed were destroyed.
The varieties of sweet corn were from Syngenta in the US, a company which was known as Novartis when it supplied the seeds behind the 2002 "Corngate" controversy.
New Zealand law sets a level of "zero tolerance" for imports of unapproved GE seed in shipments.
Mr Oughton pointed to system faults which left a single quarantine officer - operating without any independent checks or technical supervision - with the sole responsibility to clear corn seed consignments.
"This clearly created a level of risk in the event a mistake might occur."
- NZPA
