Science Centres: Aquatic Biodiversity and Biosecurity

The biosecurity challenges faced by NZ are huge, often difficult and expensive to resolve, and belong to us all. At the Third Biosecurity Summit held recently in Christchurch, MAF’s Director-General Murray Sherwin pointed out: ‘Everyone wants what they value protected, but everyone wants this at a reasonable cost. No one wants a compromised physical environment or an overly constraining regulatory environment.’

As no single agency can solve the problems alone, the focus of this year’s Biosecurity Summit was on developing and improving partnerships with key stakeholders, including regional councils, other government departments, industry, and scientists at all stages of the biosecurity spectrum.

Many of the participants had been involved in the recent Foot & Mouth, didymo, and seasquirt Emergency Incursion Responses, which provided plenty of opportunity to examine partnerships that work and those that need to be built and strengthened. Keynote addresses from the Summit can be viewed at http://www.biosecurity.govt.nz/biosec/camp-acts/summit/archive.