Australian fruit industry representatives have described a recent pest-free determination from the U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) as a mere formality, but the declaration may set an example for protocol negotiations throughout Asia.

Citrus Australia market access manager David Daniels said Western Australia's Queensland Fruit Fly-free status and the rest of the country's Medfly-free status were already recognized in practice.

The determination is called the east-west protocol, which Daniels helped prepare in a submission to U.S. authorities during his days at the Department of Agriculture.

"Nothing has really changed at all," he told www.freshfruitportal.com.

But for Australian Horticultural Exporters Association (AHEA) executive director Michelle Christoe and Cherry Growers Australia (CGA) chief executive officer Simon Boughey, the announcement may have implications for other markets.

"I don't know whether it was through good luck or good management, but the USDA put that out three days before a technical meeting with China," Boughey said.

"A lot of countries look to the United States for their leads in protocols, so other countries like China may take that lead. It provides a lot of clarity for us.

"If China accepts the east-west protocol, there's more than a likelihood that they'll drop down to cold treatment of 3°C (37.4°F) for 14 days instead of what we've currently got which is a Medfly protocol which is 16 days at 1.6°C (34.9°F) or 20 days at 2.2°C (36°F)," he said.

Christoe agreed with Boughey's perspective, although she was not certain how negotiations on a range of topics would progress with China.

"I tend to see a lot of the time when the U.S. publicizes and opinion or a positioning in the market, that other countries follow suit, particularly through Asia as they rely upon the research and the decision-making that the U.S. follows as part of the process, and I think if we look at this particular issue, APHIS have recognized this for over 10 years," she said.

"Over that period of time there have been no issues and that’s why they've undertaken this formal process of consultation with the public, and with industry, to actually form this register.

"I'm not sure how much further we’re going to progress [with China]. It may assist in some of our market access issues as opposed to contributing to the existing bilateral, the forthcoming hopeful FTA (free trade agreement), which was going to be in October but it still hasn’t taken place."

While she didn't name him, the executive also alluded to the diplomatic damages to the process caused by unrepresentative and inflammatory comments made about China by fringe Australian politician and businessman Clive Palmer.

"I think we have to be careful about what we say in the public domain. It does end up in the international domain and it does affect their decision-making," Christoe said.

Asian protocols and new pest policy approaches

On the topic of protocols, Boughey highlighted that "everyone has got their own treatments" in Asia.

"Some countries do accept these [east-west] protocols already like Taiwan, Thailand and others, but some don't...if you want to go into Indonesia you can do methyl bromide or cold treatment, and they accept fruit from a couple of pest-free areas," he said.

"If you want to go into China it's different to if you want to go into Thailand, it's different for the Philippines, there is no continuity.

"The best continuity is to send your fruit into non-protocol markets. It's unregulated in Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia, but I see that Malaysia and Vietnam are thinking of putting in protocols, and they'll look to those [China-Australia] types of discussions."

For cherries, Boughey and his colleagues continue to campaign for mainland Australia to get access to China, as Tasmania is currently the only state that can ship to the country and doesn't have enough fruit to meet demand.

Another aspect he pointed to was that most protocols were not in sync with Australia's airfreight strategy.

"We send around 95% of our fruit as airfreight at the moment from Australia now, but the protocols that have actually been delivered drop us back into cold treatment which often relates to seafreight, or you often do it on-shore and then send it out," he said.

"It's really not what the industry wants, although the industry has developed this new biosecurity management program which is a holistic management program for any grower from any region of Australia to send fruit to any country.

Under this proposed program, he said if there were any issues of fruit flies in high risk areas, negotiations could aim to get countries to accept different end treatments such as methyl bromide and cold treatment.

"Another thing that’s on the radar is irradiation because the Americans are very interested in receiving irradiated mangoes and litchis from Australia, so if that’s the case we’ll put up cherries as an option as well. The Thais are quite interested in irradiation as well for persimmons and cherries.

"The more important thing is, even though a lot of areas in Australia are designated as having Queensland Fruit Fly, a lot of the growers never see the fruit fly in their area, so what we’re trying to do is drill it down to a more systems-based approach with smaller areas that can be recognized internationally."

He highlighted Melbourne as one potential example, a pest-free place of production has been declared domestically around the Yarra Valley.

"So if we did more tests on that for fruit fly, we’d try and get that pushed up as a region to be recognized internationally," he said.

"There are a couple of other examples across other industries. The New South Wales Department of Primary Industries is doing some work up in the Northern Rivers, and they're also possibly looking at the Young-Harden area.

"Again if they do all the monitoring, then we can show that there are seasonal windows where there’s no fruit fly before the fruit is sent out."

He emphasized that all state government agencies needed to be engaged with the industry to verify systems approach practices.

"Industry can do the trapping and monitoring, but we just need it verified by the state agencies as well."

He was also positive about the sterile insect technology project that will take place in South Australia.

"That allows sterile insects, fruit flies, to be sent around Australia," he said.

"There's really renewed interest across a wide range of commodities to really attack what is the biggest threat to our market access, which is fruit fly."

The Canadian way

Boughey hoped Australia could also follow the example of Canada's brown sugar flotation method used in the North American country's protocol with China.

"It's a process where you do all the monitoring and when you bring the fruit into the packhouse you do a test where you put a brown sugar flotation, crush up some fruit, and if there are any flies they’ll come to the surface," he said.

"The Chinese have accepted it, and the fruit can then be airfreighted into China as they see it as free of the pest.

"So what we've done in Australia is say 'well okay, if the Canadians can do it for western fruit fly and Drosophila, we can do it for Queensland fruit fly in Australia'."

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