UN WANTS TO TEST COCA KILLER IN COLOMBIA

An Official Says Country Doesn't Want To Be Lab

BOGOTA, Colombia -- On a tropical Hawaiian island, a killer fungus
once ravaged a field of coca bushes.

The plague in the 1970s excited antidrug experts in Washington, who
later spent millions of dollars on a quest for a biological weapon to
destroy the South American bushes fueling the cocaine trade.

Now, under prodding from Washington, a United Nations agency wants to
test the fungus on a small plot in Colombia, where much of the world's
coca is grown.

Opponents say the fungus might be toxic to farmers and wreak havoc on
jungles that are treasures of biodiversity. Advocates say the fungus
may become a silver bullet to kill coca plants and leave others unaffected.

"Our experts tell us that it is worth trying," said Klaus Nyholm,
director of the United Nations Drug Control Program's office in
Colombia and Ecuador.

U.S. scientists say they don't know yet whether the fungus would
safely kill the nearly 300,000 acres of coca grown in Colombia without
affecting other flora, or even human life.

"The tests show so far that it is a reasonably good control agent. But
I wouldn't extrapolate from that that it will work in Colombia," said
Eric Rosenquist, a national program leader at the U.S. Department of
Agriculture's Research Service in Beltsville, Md. "The ecology is
different. There are competing organisms."

U.S. antidrug experts, though, cite compelling reasons to experiment
further with the fungus, fusarium oxysporum, which is considered a
plant pathogen, or mycoherbicide.

For one, they say the fungus can be attached to seeds and dropped from
high altitude. That beats the current strategy, in which U.S.-financed
crop dusters buzz illegal coca fields at 150 feet or so -- sometimes
risking a hail of bullets from the ground. Gunmen have hit spray
planes 36 times so far this year, U.S. officials say. Moreover, planes
could fly at night to drop the fungus, using sensors to target coca
fields.

"It looks incredibly promising," said Richard Baum, a policy analyst
at the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. "However,
we are waiting for the results of tests, and will proceed only if the
scientists working with the government of Colombia tell us that
mycoherbicides are safe."

Colombia's Environment Minister Juan Mayr is opposed.

"I told them, 'Gentlemen, your project is not welcome,"' Mayr
said.

Last year, amid an outcry from environmentalists and ranchers, Florida
shelved a plan to test another strain of fusarium oxysporum against
illegal marijuana crops.

"If it's bad for Florida, why is it good for us?" asked Colombian Sen.
Rafael Orduz, who called a hearing on the plan to test the fungus in
early June.

Infected plants are usually stunted. Their leaves turn pale green to
golden yellow and later wilt, die and drop off progressively upward
from the stem base.

The fungus survives in the soil and produces spores that can live for
many years without access to living host plants.