17 Mar 2003
Delegates Short-Changed at "Commercialising Biotech" Conference
Delegates to the Commercialising Biotechnology Conference (Auckland 18/19 March) are being short-changed on vital
information they need for decision-making about the development of the sector in New Zealand.
"Not one of the sessions or speakers addresses New Zealand's marketing-image, consumer trends or how these will impact
which projects might be commercially viable and which will fail," says Jon Carapiet, spokesman for GE-Free NZ in food
and environment.
"There is a serious risk of misleading delegates by having a bias to speakers from the supply-side and from regulators
like ERMA, " says Mr Carapiet . "The effect is to create a closed-shop of specialists reassuring each other but ignoring
the consumers and the market they are supposed to be serving."
The $2000-per-head conference fees allow delegates to attend sessions on a range of topics facing the industry but could
seriously mislead delegates into thinking ethical and regulatory issues have all been settled at a time when New Zealand
is still debating them.
The Conference also signals a major change in direction for the country, with little public awareness or debate.
New Zealand is being promoted as a place for experiments by overseas biotech-entrepreneurs and being repositioned away
from its current marketing base for food and agricultural products.
" It is wrong that New Zealand should be sold to delegates as a biotechnology play-ground when the debate about ethics
and regulation of biotechnology is still underway," says Mr Carapiet.
Commercialising biotechnology raises a range of issues that communities and governments around the world are being faced
with.
Last week there were warnings in the media that tests for some forms of Breast Cancer could become unaffordable because
of license fees charged by the company holding the patent.
Without an analysis of how commercial biotechnology can be guided by standards of community acceptability the delegates
risk being sold-to rather than properly informed
The government has recently been consulting on " Bio Prospecting" in New Zealand and has itself recognised special
issues raised for Maori under the Treaty. However, before the round is finished , government speakers at the conference
already seem to be promoting opportunities for investors.
"There is a real risk that the one-sided take at the conference will mislead delegates into believing they can go ahead
with speculative projects without listening to consumers or respecting community values," says Mr Carapiet. "That is not
the case- as evidenced by the High Court review on GE cows sought by MADGE."
ENDS
Contact: Jon Carapiet- 09 815 3370