Science Media Centre

Budget 2013 saw a net increase of around $50 million in science and innovation funding, according to Science and Innovation Minister Steven Joyce. $130 million of funding has been committed to boosting R&D efforts in companies and start-ups, $107m of which will come from the Government’s internationally focused growth package, with $23m re-prioritised from elsewhere [...]

Global food supply will have to double by the middle of the century to feed the world’s burgeoning population, and less arable land and water will be available for agricultural production. At the same time, crop yields may drop by up to 27 percent over the same period due to climate change, making achieving this goal that [...]

Researchers from the University of Melbourne have discovered that two different vaccines used to control an infectious disease in chickens have been able to recombine to generate new virus strains. Their research was published today in the journal Science. The resulting new viruses have been responsible for significant outbreaks of disease and death in farmed [...]

Electric vehicles are now a global reality, but what are the market and regulatory challenges we face in creating an infrastructure to support them? The Science Media Centre held a media briefing exploring the reality and potential of electric vehicles in  New Zealand ahead of the APEC Electric Vehicle Connectivity Workshop and expert meeting at [...]

Adding folic acid to foods is back on the table — here’s a chance to get your head around it. In 2009, the New Zealand government deferred a decision on whether to require fortification of bread with folic acid — to help raise levels of the nutrient folate in women of child-bearing age — citing [...]

Did you know that 96 percent of New Zealand is underwater? New Zealand’s ocean territory is vast. Its EEZ (Exclusive Economic Zone) stretches across an area twenty times greater than its dry land.  Scientific surveying allowed the country to expand its claim further in 2008, giving it rights to additional seabed minerals and resources.  But [...]

Sea-level rise is coming, and planning for it is already underway, but coastal development across New Zealand relies on sea-level rise projections that are increasingly out-of-step with the latest science.  Determining how councils and governments should plan for future sea level rise will be the focus of a conference in Wellington this week. Councils around [...]

Environment officials say they have no plans to continue creating a National Environmental Standard (NES) for future sea level rise – instead they will leave it up to individual councils to make separate plans. Though the exact sea level rise over the next few centuries is expected to vary from one region of the world [...]

Evidence suggests that climate change has led to changes in climate extremes such as heat waves, record high temperatures and, in many regions, heavy precipitation in the past half century, according to the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Climate extremes, or even a series of non-extreme events, in combination with [...]

This fact sheet was produced by the SMC UK to give journalists a background on the Schmallenberg virus currently affecting livestock in the UK and Europe. Background Schmallenberg virus, aka SBV, is an emerging livestock disease that has been detected in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the UK. Outbreaks of disease in [...]

When it comes to healthy food, consumers are often at the mercy of misleading dietary claims from manufacturers. Now researchers have cut through the confusion with a no-nonsense list of foods that the overweight can avoid without compromising nutrition. Researchers from the University of Otago, Christchurch have developed list of foods that they describe as [...]