Genetically Engineered Milk Campaign - New Zealand

This campaign used a shocking image to provoke discussion and action. The billboards depicted a naked woman with 4 breasts on her hands and knees being milked by a milking machine, with the red letters "GE" (genetically engineered) branded on her rump. Although the billboards included no words, the underlying message is that projects such as a plan for generating genetically engineered cow's milk will lead to a disturbing world in which genetic engineering has "gone wild". Alannah Currie, MAdGE founder and former member of the pop group the Thompson Twins, said she designed the ads to provoke debate: "The ethics of such experiments have not even been discussed by the wider public. How far will we allow them to go? Where is the line in the sand? Why is the government lifting the moratorium on GE when we have not even had a public debate on ethics?". During the month of October, MAdGE posted 5 ads in Auckland and 2 in Wellington.

To support the billboards' message, MAdGE staged public protests. In collaboration with Greenpeace, the group organised thousands of demonstrators (police estimate 15,000; MAdGE estimates about 30,000) who marched in Auckland and Wellington on October 11 2003 to protest the lift of the genetically modified organisms ban. In addition, Currie and 10 other MAdGE women staged a protest in the debating chamber in the New Zealand Houses of parliament during question time. The women removed their shirts, revealing pink and black bras; they also carried banners that said "GE Free".

Nutrition, Agriculture.

The billboards were created in response to efforts by AgResearch, the country's largest biotech company, to insert human genes into cows to create designer milk. Members of MAdGE suspect that Fonterra, the country's largest milk company, is planning similar experiments. Fonterra denies this. On October 29 2003, the moratorium was lifted, as scheduled.

The public response to the campaign was mixed. In the words of William Rolleston, chairman of the Life Sciences Network (a biotech industry organisation for New Zealand and Australia), "MAdGE's latest grasp for public attention denigrates women and illustrates what little grasp this group has of reality. New Zealanders will be justified in relegating MAdGE to the pages of bad-taste science fiction." MAdGE's Currie acknowledged that the campaign "is definitely degrading to women, but more degrading to women is putting human genes in milk. It's punk art." Others said that the billboards only add to public confusion about genetic engineering.

MAdGE is a network of politically non-aligned women who actively resist the use of genetically engineered organisms in food and the release of those organisms into the environment. In addition to carrying out advocacy actions, MAdGE collects, correlates, and distributes information relating to genetic engineering. MAdGE believes that "GE ingredients must be proved to be 100% safe before we feed them to our families. Our children are not guinea pigs... we want the freedom to choose what we grow and eat".