John Moffat: Bovine disease vaccine research lead on the impact of Bovine Viral Diarrhoea on costs

There’s hopes an improved vaccine against an infectious disease running rife through New Zealand cattle could ease costs for farmers. 

The Ministry for Primary Industries is backing a project which aims to develop a modified vaccine against Bovine Viral Diarrhoea. 

It impacts about 80% of our dairy and beef herds and costs the industry more than $190 million each year. 

Research lead John Moffat told Mike Hosking that it's one of the many threats farmers face. 

He says the virus is one of the most important issues needing to be dealt with in the cattle industry. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Research underway on a new vaccine to prevent prevalent bow
bine disease costs our farmers one hundred and ninety million
dollars every year. Three vaccines currently available are only sixty
to sixty five percent effective. So MPI are backing this
new research, which is led by John Moffatt, who is
with us. John, very good morning to you.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Good morning.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Is this exciting?

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Oh? Reasonably yeah? And the violence think yes.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
The reason I asked the question, are you on the
verge of something or is this sort of a fishing expedition?

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Well, no, it's far more than a fifteen expedition, Mike.
The technology we're using is globally is reasonably familiar, and
we're adapting that technology for the New Zealand environment.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Really okay, so there is stuff out there that is
potentially more effective that if we adapted to us, then
we hit paid it.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Yes, potentially with all signs. You can't be absolutely, but yes,
exactly right, Miche.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
What's the time frame on this.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
All going? Well? We hope to be in the marketplace
registered in twenty twenty eight.

Speaker 1 (01:14):
And does that have commercial implications globally? I mean, how
do these things work with NPI involved of you crack
a nut, do you get to own it, clip the ticket,
sell it, all of that sort of stuff, or you
don't work that way.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
The partnership is a cross through organization, so MPI is
just one of the partners. Agra Health and jim Based
Animal Health Company is providing the majority of the support
for this project. So it ends up that they own
the rights to it and then we can make it

(01:48):
global essentially, but it's principally designed for the New Zealand farmers.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
Okay, of all the things farmers face, where does bovine
fit and the problems around it and the lack of
effectiveness of the current vaccines, where.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
Does it fit?

Speaker 1 (02:05):
I mean, is this a major findings?

Speaker 2 (02:08):
Are incredibly complex thing with all sorts of different threats,
you know, the price of fertilizer and fuel, etcetera. And
another animal health diseases as viral infection is probably one
of the most important that we deal with in the
cattle industry in this country. To put it in a perspective,
you know, it ranks up there with probably arguably with

(02:29):
things like internal parasites. As an infectious disease issue.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Well, we wish you the best with it. I hope
it goes well. We'll talk again when you crack it.
Nice to talk to you, John Moffatt. For more from
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