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Speaker 1: And in the climate battle. This is good news. I

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Speaker 1: think we've got progress in the area of what they

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Speaker 1: call a methane vaccine. Methone vaccine apparently is the holy

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Speaker 1: grail for farming. Scientists are basically wanting to develop antibodies

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Speaker 1: that reduce methane emissions from animals. AGRA zero New Zealand's

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Speaker 1: chief executive Wayne mcnee's with us. Wayne, very good morning

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Speaker 1: to you.

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Speaker 2: Good morning Mike.

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Speaker 1: On a scale of one to ten in excitement terms, ten,

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Speaker 1: you're fizzing. One. You couldn't give a monkey's where are

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Speaker 1: we at on that scale?

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Speaker 2: You asked me this last time. I think this is

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Speaker 2: I'm pretty fizzing about this one. Actually, I reckon I'm

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Speaker 2: getting up round this sort of seven or eight. This

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Speaker 2: is a really exciting opportunity to try and develop a

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Speaker 2: methane vaccine.

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Speaker 1: So the thirteen and a half million we're talking about

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Speaker 1: is that on a path to a result we know

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Speaker 1: eventually will happen, or on a path we just don't

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Speaker 1: quite know where we're going yet.

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Speaker 2: Look, I think we're on a path to knowing we

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Speaker 2: will eventually get there. Another company we've invested in called

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Speaker 2: Arka Bio in the United States is proven you can

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Speaker 2: make a methane vaccine. Still a lot of work to

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Speaker 2: do there, but you know it can be done. So

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Speaker 2: the team here, we're investing to develop a bigger team

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Speaker 2: with egg Research. Bring the team together with other researchers

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Speaker 2: and push hard to get a product that farmers will

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Speaker 2: be able to use.

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Speaker 1: That sort of answers my question. Are you in competition

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Speaker 1: with these other people? How many other people are there?

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Speaker 1: And are you collaborating?

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Speaker 2: There's only two vaccine companies and we've invested in both

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Speaker 2: of them, so yeah, we are looking for them to collaborate.

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Speaker 2: But we're investing in a portfolio of possible solutions for farmers,

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Speaker 2: partly because some of them may not work, and also

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Speaker 2: to give farmers choices so that when these things come

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Speaker 2: to market, you know they don't have to do just

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Speaker 2: one thing.

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Speaker 1: When you get there, How commercial does it become how quickly?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? And vaccines a pretty easy to scale. So if

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Speaker 2: they can make one that works and what we'd be

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Speaker 2: looking for as a twenty to twenty five percent reduction

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Speaker 2: over about six months with a single vaccine shot, they're

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Speaker 2: pretty easy to scale. I mean we've seen that recently,

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Speaker 2: haven't we you can make vaccines quite easily and quite cheaply,

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Speaker 2: so you know, once we've got it, it should be

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Speaker 2: quite easy to make.

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Speaker 1: So if you can reduce methane by twenty five percent,

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Speaker 1: what does that do to the climate debate?

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Speaker 2: That makes a huge difference. It would be massive if

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Speaker 2: we can get there with a vaccine, because it's relatively

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Speaker 2: easy for farmers to administer vaccines already widely used in

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Speaker 2: animal health, and this could be you know, for New Zealand,

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Speaker 2: it would be huge because we're a pastoral farming system,

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Speaker 2: but worldwide, eighty percent of remnants grays on pasture, so

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Speaker 2: it would be a massive breakthrough.

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Speaker 1: But when you look at the politics and the yankst

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Speaker 1: around the ets and all of that sort of thing,

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Speaker 1: if you and our biggest dealer is methane emissions, if

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Speaker 1: you can do twenty five percent on the farm, that's

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Speaker 1: a government re thinking their entire approach, isn't it.

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Speaker 2: We've got to get yet there yet, But yes.

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Speaker 1: I mean yeah, but with one you told me we're physics.

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Speaker 2: Our customers from New Zealand are asking for reductions of

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Speaker 2: thirty percent of methane by twenty thirty, so it's a

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Speaker 2: big customer ball here from the likes of Nestlie to

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Speaker 2: known McDonald's others. So this is this is hopefully part

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Speaker 2: of the solution for that. There's still a way to go,

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Speaker 2: though I am passing it as an exciting opportunity.

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Speaker 1: Okay, we'll get you back on and I'll ask you

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Speaker 1: the same question for the third time to see how

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Speaker 1: we go. So you can't make me down for consistency,

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Speaker 1: Wayne McNee Who's where do you go from visiting well way?

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Speaker 1: That's that's a that's a very good point. For more

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Speaker 1: from the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to news talks

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