LOCATION: Settlement of Gvardeyskiy outside the City of Otar, Kazakhstan
SUBORDINATION: During the Soviet period, the NISKhI was formally under the control of the Soviet Ministry of Agriculture. Now it is under the supervision of the National Center for Biotechnology (NCB).
ACTIVITIES: During the Soviet period, the NISKhI was engaged in production of various BW agents harmful to livestock and plants. Today, the institute conducts fundamental research into the molecular biology of various pathogens.
STATUS: In operation.
HISTORY:
The Scientific Research Agricultural Institute (NISKhI) was established in 1958 in the settlement of Gvardeyskiy outside the city of Otar, about 180 kilometers from Almaty. The NISKhI was the only BW research center in Kazakhstan specializing in viruses and belonged to a distinct group of Soviet BW facilities that developed agents harmful to livestock and plants. Although the institute was subordinate to the USSR Ministry of Agriculture, its director held military rank. The NISKhI had cooperative ties with Russian centers conducting similar research in Vladimir (under the Ministry of Agriculture), in Sverdlovsk (under the MOD), and at Vector in Novosibirsk (under Biopreparat), where the agents produced at the NISKhI were tested. The institute did not have direct links with the Stepnogorsk and Vozrozhdeniye facilities, evidently because of its specialization in anti-crop and anti-livestock agents.
Research on anti-crop agents possibly began in the 1970s, when the NISKhI received orders from military authorities to study the resistance of crops to various biological pathogens. The institute had broad expertise in highly pathogenic and exotic diseases of livestock and crops caused by viruses and other agents. Among these are Rinderpest virus, Newcastle disease virus, African swine fever virus, sheep pox virus, goat pox virus, fowl pox virus, blue-tongue virus (catarrhal fever of sheep), herpes virus (Aujeszky's disease), and cereal rust fungi.
In 1991, Moscow terminated all military research and left the NISKhI without central administration or funding. Many specialists left to work at institutes in Russia.
After Moscow stopped funding the NISKhI, the institute initially fell under the administrative control of the Kazakhstani Ministry of Agriculture, and the conversion process to peaceful research started. In 1993, the newly created National Center for Biotechnology (NCB) brought the NISKhI under its control together with Stepnogorsk Scientific Experimental and Production Base (SNOPB) and Kazakhstani civilian biotechnology facilities. At present, the NISKhI conducts fundamental research into the molecular biology of various pathogens: viruses, bacteria, and fungi harmful to plants and animals. The institute also develops methods of preparing nutrient media for virology research, and possesses an extensive agricultural pathogen library, which requires considerable measures for ensuring physical security. The library includes collections of microorganisms, viruses, pathogens, plants, and also vivarium, greenhouse, and agricultural technologies. For enhancement of its security (and also of pathogen collections at the Anti-Plague Scientific Research Institute in Almaty), $4 million was allocated under the CTR program, which is specifically designed to provide bio-security and bio-safety protection for national strain collections at two facilities in Kazakhstan. The goal of the program was the creation of both secure working conditions for personnel and the physical security of the institute. As a result of the program, excess infrastructure was removed, a reinforced concrete fence was erected around the site (links to CTR website and Carnegie Endowment website), an alarm system was installed within the security perimeter, and training was provided for the institute's security personnel.
Key Sources: Gulbarshyn Bozheyeva, Yerlan Kunakbayev, and Dastan Yeleukenov, "Former Soviet Biological Weapons Facilities in Kazakhstan: Past, Present and Future," Occasional Paper, No. 1, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, June 1999; Jonathan B. Tucker and Raymond A. Zilinskas, "The 1971 Smallpox Epidemic in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, and the Soviet Biological Warfare Program," Occasional Paper No. 9, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, June 2002; Jonathan B. Tucker's speech during the briefing on "Biological Decontamination of Vozrozhdeniye Island: The US-Uzbek Agreement"; BW Materials Security and Transparency, Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) webpage at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) Website, <http://www.dtra.mil/ctr/ctr_kazakhstan.html>; Gennadiy Lepeshkin, "Byvshiye obyekty po razrabotke BO v Tsentralnoy Azii," Problemy Nerasprastraneniya, Special Edition, April 2001; Yevgeniy Troitskiy, "Fizicheskaya zashita, uchet i kontrol biomaterialov v NISKhI MON RK," Problemy Nerasprastraneniya, Special Edition, April 2001.
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Updated September 2005 |
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