The only specialised marine publication in Oceania that focuses on the maritime industry, from super yachts to small craft to large commercial ships, including coastal shipping, tugs, tow boats, barges, ferries, tourist, sport-fishing craft
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Counting our BY DOROTHY-JEAN MCCOUBREY I n December I arrived back in New Zealand after nine months working on food safety and public health issues throughout the African continent. Many people have asked me about the food safety situation in Africa, as well as my perception now, on the essence that makes Kiwi society unique. One thing is for sure, wherever travel takes me it always confi rms that the natural and political environment have a huge impact on our mental and physical health status, and that the quality and safety of our food supply is intrinsically linked to these environmental conditions. This is something the shellfi sh industry has long understood because shellfi sh harvested from polluted areas pose a signifi cant food safety and market risk for both the consumer and industry. To manage this risk, all developed countries require compulsory environmental monitoring of commercial shellfi sh harvest areas. In New Zealand hardy sampling teams regularly jump into boats and head out to sea in a range of weather conditions to collect water and shellfi sh for micro and chemical contaminant testing. These samples must then be carefully packed on ice and quickly delivered to a laboratory which is often far away from the shellfi sh resource. For example, Parengarenga Harbour is eight hours drive from Auckland city. The laboratory does their professional thing and if all goes well the results are usually available within 24-72 hours. All this sounds easy, but ask any sampler and they will provide any number of "whoops" stories. Samples lost overboard in stormy weather, the local courier company forgetting to collect the samples, samples lost in transit or broken on arrival at the laboratory, are just a few examples. This sad situation could be about to change as the Cawthron Institute has been working with international scientists from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute and Stanford University to trial an Environmental Sample Processor, or ESP, in New Zealand coastal waters. The ESP was developed by a team of scientists and engineers at MBARI and is a robotic underwater molecular biology laboratory. Once moored in the open ocean it can automatically collect water samples and detect specifi c organisms using their DNA. The results are then transmitted back to the laboratory in real-time via radio communications. It also measures other important environmental parameters such as temperature, salinity and turbidity. This new automatic system has great positive potential. Reducing sampling resources and immediate results are just the start. Ongoing remote surveillance means that when a contamination problem is detected laboratory staff can MARINE BACTERIA Dr Susie Wood working with Cawthron Institute's culture collection. immediately alert someone in the harvest area, so that they can fi nd the pollution source and mitigate it as soon as possible. It also has the potential of providing the industry with a lot more predictability about the best time to harvest. The industry can watch as all the favourable environmental parameters line up (salinity, temperature, turbidity and micro status) to ensure that they not only pluck a safe product, but also a quality one from the sea. ESPs have been trialed in many coastal waters, including Monterey Bay, Florida, Massachusetts and Hawaii. Laboratory and fi eld trials have demonstrated near-real time detection of bacteria, harmful algal bloom species, the algal biotoxin domoic acid, and invertebrates. The trial in New Zealand will be the fi rst time an ESP has been deployed outside of the United States. It will be situated in Tasman Bay for four weeks during May and June. The deployment will focus on targeting organisms that are a signifi cant problem for the aquaculture industry, including harmful microbes and algal bloom species. Potentially, the ESP can be used to detect the DNA from a wide range of organisms including invertebrate larvae and also the actual toxins produced by harmful algal bloom species. This new technology is incredibly exciting and Cawthron staff say they feel very privileged to be working in partnership with MBARI. Kiwis are pretty special because of our constant desire to improve and while New Zealand is small we are big on using technological innovation to maintain our seafood industry at the cutting edge of food quality and safety. MAY/JUNE 2012 ■ NZ AQUACULTURE ■ 11