The E Word
Short Stories and Creative Writing
Ultimatum
A short story dreamed up while sitting at the National Park Railway Cafe
The platform at Waverly Station was humming with rushing bodies and noise. I am sat on a cold wooden bench, morning air stinging my cheeks, people watching. Beautifully manicured women, with their sleek short haircuts and red lipstick, cackle together as they parade past me to the waiting seats for the first-class carriages. Men clutching brief cases and cigarettes talk among themselves, glancing up occasionally to give a nod or sly grin to the pretty women sauntering by. On the bench next to me sits a doe-eyed young mother, clutching a wailing bundle close to her chest, murmuring soothing sounds, one hand holding the hand of a small boy wearing a Brixton hat. I just sit, filled with nerves, waiting, tightly clutching my purse and ticket on my lap.
“South train to London, boarding in five minutes!” shouts a plump man in a tightly fitting pinstripe suit, vaguely resembling Toad of Toad Hall, from the window of the ticket office. “William, where are you” I whisper under my breath, beginning to tear at the sides of my fingernails. It is the middle of winter in Edinburgh and the snow is thick and white, blanketing the normally dirty and dull platform. I pull my coat tighter around my shoulders. Eyes wide. Scanning.
As the big hand of the large hanging clock ticks over to nine, I hear the clattering of the train approaching from the distance and the blearing of the horn as it slows, rolling into the station, breaks screaming. The seat beneath me trembles and suddenly the platform goes dark with steam and smoke. The brightly coloured people soon become silhouettes, darting left and right off to their assigned loading areas. The sound of the engine screeches as I rise from my seat. “All aboard the nine o’clock train for London, please have your tickets ready and all your belongings secure”.
I gaze down the platform in the direction of the city, stretching my eyes open wide, searching. The overhanging clock ticks over, one minute, two minutes, three minutes. As the steam evaporates into the sky, so do the people on the platform as they disappear onto the train, leaving few stragglers wrangling luggage and wailing children left to board. I dart my head left and right, urgency and panic rising in my chest. “Final call!” shouts Mr Toad. I freeze, taking one final examination across the platform. No William.
As the final whistle blows, I stand up straight, drawing in a deep breath, accepting the defeat that I am doing this with or without him. Perhaps a threat I should not have made. Holding onto small shards of my pride and the sting of a newly broken heart, I pick up my cases and climb up inside the carriage. The train rolls out of Waverly Station and across the snow draped city, church spires and leafless trees piercing into the grey sky. The train is southbound to Paddington Station in London, travelling forward to a new smog covered horizon of opportunity. Sitting back in my seat, refusing to look out the window, I let go of the last fragments of hope, I realise that I too am travelling forward.
Embracing Technology to
Reduce the Farming Footprint
Ella Jensen
Supporting positive change for a sector we rely on. - A Short piece derived from my Masters Dissertation 2020.
The time has come for New Zealand to update its 24-year old legislation surrounding the use of genetic technologies on farms. The New Zealand government has recently committed to becoming both carbon neutral and a global climate change leader. The agricultural sector produces nearly half of New Zealand’s greenhouse gas emissions. If we are serious as a nation about carbon neutrality, the agricultural sector must be supported with the tools to achieve that status. It is time to re-open a nation-wide dialogue on the use of genetic technologies on New Zealand farms as a response to climate change.
In November 2019, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern described the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Bill as “New Zealand’s second Nuclear Free Moment”. Making the comparison that New Zealand becoming a carbon neutral country as a means of combating climate change, is both as critical and as monumental as when the country became Nuclear Free in 1987. If this moment is as critical as she claims, this is the time for a serious public conversation about reconsidering the use and development of genetic technologies. Legislation must be updated to permit new developments which will support environmental solutions. The current focus on identifying and demonising those sectors that are perceived to cause environmental harm denies those sectors potential tools to reduce their footprint and stalls progress in combating climate change.
New Zealand’s primary legislative instrument regulating the use of genetically modified and gene edited organisms – the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act (HSNO Act) – is one of the most restrictive in the world. But since its enactment in the late 1990s, there has been significant improvement in the precision and efficiency of genetic technologies. Various genetically modified or edited solutions are now available to help farmers reduce their environmental footprint. New techniques are constantly being developed, such as improved breeding methods using genetic selection, the altering of the gut bacteria of livestock, and editing livestock’s feed using gene editing techniques such as CRISPR. These developments have demonstrated improved production efficiency, carbon efficiency and reduced water use.
In light of these advances, the essentially precautionary approach to the use of genetic technologies adopted by the HSNO Act two decades ago is still adhered to and should be revisited. The consequences of climate change are visible and growing, as we have seen recently with the Australian bushfires. We cannot afford to approach climate change ‘cautiously’, and the phasing out of the agricultural sector to achieve carbon neutrality is not viable. The sector is a backbone of the economy and supports the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders. We must pursue an agricultural sector which can flourish in a carbon-neutral nation. Support is required to enable the sector to become more sustainable in its practices though innovation and technology, including the safe use of gene editing techniques in livestock or feed production to reduce carbon emissions.
A prominent ethical concern underpinning much of the debate about genetic technologies is whether humans have the right to alter nature and “play God”. Particularly relevant in New Zealand is a Māori spiritual and cultural belief of the relationship between the natural and human world, centred in whakapapa where all things are interconnected by genealogy. Objections towards biotechnology at the time of the enactment of the HSNO Act were rooted in the prospect of damage to the environment along with concerns about humans medalling with the natural world. Humans have been meddling with nature for thousands of years, using traditional breeding techniques to select for the desired yield crop or animal trait. The rising challenge of climate change requires us to ask whether new developments in gene editing techniques can act as tools for mitigation of environmental damage and improved protection of the environment and native species, such as Manuka, Pohutukawa or native birds, through targeted disease and pest control.
Conversation surrounding the use of genetic technologies is well overdue a change in tone. The technology has developed significantly since the creation of the HSNO Act and we face unprecedented challenges to the sustainability of our society and economy. We cannot disregard the cultural, spiritual and ethical questions that have informed debate against biotechnology for decades, nor should we ignore the potential risks that come with any technology, but we should acknowledge that innovations and ideas based on biotechnology can help New Zealand reduce its environmental footprint and become more sustainable without sacrificing those values. It is time to foster active conversation, and debate, across New Zealand to create informed and updated policy which takes into consideration the rising challenge of climate change and the potential use of new technologies to reduce New Zealand’s farming footprint.