X. Annex A - Transcript of the Joint Meeting with Experts
Chairman
[introductory statement by the Chairman] � with that introduction I would first invite all the participants to introduce themselves and then I would suggest that we start with the opening comments of the experts. Dr. Ducom, Dr. Heather and Mr. Taylor in that order. May I first ask that the experts present themselves?
Dr. Ducom
Mr. Chairman, thank you. First of all I am French and my mother-tongue is French, is not English, that's why my brief statement will be short. Officially I belong to the French Ministry of Agriculture, but in this session I am not mandated by my Ministry. I am just a private expert here. Some highlights - First of all, pardon? [Chairman interrupts]
Chairman
Thank you. If there is need for translation we have here bilingual persons which can assist you if necessary.
Dr. Ducom
My problem is that I can understand but to express myself is much more difficult.
Chairman
And of course you are very correct, all the experts are in their personal capacity and do not represent an institution or country. Ok, Dr. Heather?
Dr. Heather
I am Neil Heather. I come from Brisbane, Australia where prior to ceasing duty with the Queensland State Department of Primary Industries, I was research leader of what we call the Market Access Quarantine Group, responsible for developing fruit-fly treatments for access to export markets from Australia, i.e., quarantine disinfestation treatments. I am currently affiliated with the University of Queensland at Gatton College where I am termed an Honorary Research Consultant so I have no organisational responsibilities of any kind.
Chairman
Thank you. And Mr. Taylor?
Mr. Taylor
Thank you Mr Chairman. Good morning Ladies and Gentlemen. I am very happy to be here and pleased to have been invited to this Panel and to visit Geneva again. I am employed at the Natural Resources Institute in the United Kingdom which until 1996 was a government agency but since that time we've been sold off and we are now part of the University of Greenwich. Much of our work continues in the same manner and we are largely funded by the UK government although I am here representing myself, as I do, on the methyl bromide technical options committee. So I stand as an individual. I spend most of my time working overseas in developing countries on pest control activities, particularly with fumigation. Thank you.
Chairman
Thank you Mr. Taylor. I now turn to the United States delegation.
Mr. Brinza
Thank you Mr. Chairman. My name is Dan Brinza from the United States. I will ask other members of the US delegation to take the mike very briefly to introduce themselves, starting with the head of delegation.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Good morning Mr. Chairman. My name is Bruce Hirsh and I am an Assistant General Counsel with the Office of the United States Trade Representative.
Mr. Bonner
Good morning. Peter Bonner, US Department of Agriculture.
Mr. Vick
My name is Ken Vick, United States Department of Agriculture.
Mr. Thaw
I'm John Thaw with Plant Protection and Quarantine, Department of Agriculture.
Mr. Leesch
I'm Jim Leesch. I'm with the US Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service.
Mr. Fedchock
Craig Fedchock with US Department of Agriculture, APHIS.
Ms. Roberts
I'm Donna Roberts with the US Department of Agriculture here at the Mission in Geneva.
Ms. Erickson
Audrae Erickson, US Trade Representatives Office, Washington DC.
Chairman
Thank you. I now return to the Japanese delegation please.
Mr. Yokota
Thank you Mr. Chairman. My name is Jun Yokota. I'm the Deputy Director-General of the Economic Affairs Bureau, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I would like to turn to my colleagues to present themselves.
Mr. Kato
My name is Takashi Kato. I'm from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and Deputy Director-General in the Agricultural Production Bureau. Thank you.
Mr. Nakakita
My name is Hiroshi Nakakita from National Food Research Institute, studying about how to control stored product insect.
Mr. Kawakami
My name is Fusao Kawakami. I work in the Research Division of Yokohama Plant Quarantine Station. For many years I engage in the development of the disinfestation methods for quarantine so I [was involved in] research data submitted from foreign countries.
Mr. Sato
My name is Kimihiko Sato, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology.
Mr. Sakai
My name is Masaki Sakai, Agriculture Counsellor, Embassy of Japan, Washington DC.
Mr. Saito
My name is Noboru Saito. I am working for Plant Production Division, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. Thank you.
Mr. Sanatani
My name is Sanatani. I am from Ministry of Agriculture in Tokyo.
Ms. Hirota
My name is Mitue Hirota. I come from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Mr. Yokoi
My name is Yukio Yokoi, Plant Protection Division, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries.
Mr. Shiragaki
My name is Tatsunori Shiragaki from the Ministry of Agriculture.
Mr. Motai
My name is Futao Motai from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan.
Mr. Yamashita
My name is Masayuki Yamashita. I'm with the Japanese Mission here in Geneva.
Mr. Nirei
I am Hideo Nirei from the Authority Bureau of Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Mr. Chujo
Kazuo Chujo, Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Mr. Ito
My name is Koichi Ito, Japanese Mission in Geneva. Thank you.
Chairman
Thank you for these introductions. I think that we now can start our discussion according to the procedures I proposed, and that means that I will start by giving the floor one by one to our experts for any general introductory remarks they believe are appropriate.
So first, in alphabetical order, Dr. Ducom, you have the floor.
Dr. Ducom
Thank you Mr. Chairman. I have just five remarks on the question and my answers, mainly on the questions.
First of all, the questions of the Panel are relevant but often there is no clear response to give because we miss data on the exact subject on variety by variety testing. Second point, it seems that both sides want to keep their habits; the arguments can be seen as black or white and each party has found, for example in their answers to the questions, arguments against each other in the same paper. The third point is that the scientific facts given by Japan are maybe too narrow. I mean, for example, when they give some differences between varieties the confidence limit is not a biological fact, it is a statistical fact. I mean, biologically speaking, the difference does not matter � just one per cent makes, statistically speaking, there is a significant difference while biologically speaking there is no difference. We have examples of that. The fourth point. For the USA position one variety for all is maybe uncomfortable because biology or physiology is sometimes surprising. That may be the problem. And the last point is that maybe that the concept of CxT product is not used enough in this dispute, or in this matter.
Chairman
Thank you Dr. Ducom. Then I turn to Dr. Heather.
Dr. Heather
Thank you. As with Dr. Ducom I have had some difficulty through not seeing all of the working data but had I seen it, there would not have been sufficient time to perhaps look at it in the detail that's required. Just to perhaps go through your original questions, if I may. The concepts: I think in my view, the most important part here is the interpretation put on the LD values, the LD50 value for example. This is not a precise numerical measure and of necessity it has had to be used in a rather less precise way than it would otherwise be. It is not a direct measurement on the insect, it is a measurement on the insect where it is influenced by the fruit in the chambers so it is not a precise measurement. In fact, if you look at an LD value it's easy to take one figure but realistically you should be looking at what we call the confidence limits or the fiducial limits and these are ranges within which that value falls and perhaps would lead to a better understanding if we thought of it in that way. As you recall, because the quarantine treatments are not measured at the median dose or the LD50 dose but at the extreme dose, these limits become very wide and it is not wise to take arithmetic cognizance. You must take into account the truest statistical interpretation of these figures. Sorry I have talked too much on that but I think it is a very important thing; that precision is easily misplaced.
The confirmatory tests, I have every confidence in and I think that's fairly well accepted throughout [by all parties]. There's been some consideration about the higher susceptibility of (a question asked by Japan) on the higher susceptibility of a commodity for a range of reasons which are outside of the direct interaction between the fruit and the treatment. But here we can have such instances as a late variety of fruit compared to an early variety of fruit; there will be many more insects in the place of origin of the late maturing variety than there were in the beginning. This is the type of background that I wish that comment to be interpreted against.
The sorption I would like to leave to my colleagues who are rather more wise in the theory of the behaviour of gases and fumigants than I, although I have used them to an extent where I've some understanding of them. The statistical analysis, or the CxT product value, by the way, is a much more precise measure than a LD value, much more precise, because it is a physical measurement rather than a biological one. There's been some misunderstanding perhaps about Tukey's multiple range test. It is simply a less sensitive type of analysis which means that it should be more reliable, but could I say that for statistically demonstrated differences, these must always be viewed against the background of the biological conditions which give rise to them. What is biologically unlikely, but statistically shown, must be viewed with some reserve. Biological creditability is just as important as statistical demonstration of differences. I think that they were the main points that would arise. Could I ask Mr. Chairman do you wish us to address the additional questions? Thank you.
Chairman
Yes, as you know the Panel has distributed yesterday evening some additional questions. My intention is to raise them after we have discussed the questions raised by the United States and the Japan, and of course I will raise only those of them which have not already been covered by the questions of United States or Japan. So the order will be the questions by the United States, the questions by Japan, the questions by Panel. Ok. Then Mr. Taylor?
Mr. Taylor
Thank you Mr. Chairman. I don't have too much to say at this particular time. I think one of the things that we must accept is that temperature is very, very important in fumigation and also particularly in the case of methyl bromide sorption is of overwhelming interest and knowledge of what is happening is terribly important.
If I might just digress very, very briefly - there is another fumigant, phosphine, which is used for durable commodities. There is little or no sorption of phosphine and, therefore, the dosage rates really don't vary much at all for different commodities. It may be rather an over simplification but it could be said that, compared do methyl bromide, there is just one dosage rate for phosphine. Coming back of course to the subject matter of methyl bromide, we do have an overwhelming difference in as much as there is a lot of sorption by commodities, and in fact, in durable commodities which I have to refer to because they are my main area of experience, certainly in the original schedules drawn up for commodity fumigation a commodity dosage was specified. So in fact great importance was taken of the particular commodity in deciding what the application rate should be because there was such a large difference between commodities that you had to define the commodity and then decide what the dose should be based on that commodity, let alone on what insect you were controlling. So in brief, the fact that there may be a high fat or oil content in which the methyl bromide would dissolve meant that a lot of the gas was lost, so certainly the sorption factor is very important and so important that this created differences in terms of dosage rates used. Now whether or not these differences exist in fruit is something which I am certainly not confident to comment on, but the differences certainly, if they were there, would be sufficient to cause different dosage rates to be required and therefore testing programmes to be necessary. But if the differences between varieties are so small that there is little or no sorption, then it seems to me that varietal testing is perhaps not something which needs to be taken into consideration, particularly if tests have shown, for example, that the chemical composition of the fruit varieties do not vary very much. Because again, going back to what I said about the durable commodities, certainly the differences there are very significant and are so significant that dosage rates are specified for different commodities but not of course for different varieties, for example, of wheat.
One other point, I would just like to reiterate what Dr. Heather said. LD50 values are very useful if you are comparing insects, for example, for levels of resistance. But I don't think in this case we're looking to define dosage rates even for - shall we say, non-quarantine treatments, we would want to use LD50 - we'd want to use higher levels of control such as, well, certainly the LD99 or LD99.9. And therefore the LD50 I don't think is at all relevant in this situation.
So I would just say then that sorption seems to me to be something that we need to know more about. If it can be shown that the levels of sorption are such that they are significant enough to remove the fumigant to an extent that it is going to raise some doubt as to the efficacy of the treatment, then of course we could say that varietal testing was necessary. But unless we can show that it seems to me that the need to test by variety does still need to be established. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
Chairman
Thank you Mr. Taylor. I now turn to the United States delegation and you have the floor.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Thank you very much Mr. Chairman. First of all, on behalf of the US delegation I would like to thank the experts for agreeing to serve and for their very helpful comments today and their responses. We very much appreciate your taking the time to be with us today. With your permission, Mr. Chairman, I would like to take about five minutes just to consult with the delegation to consider in light of the initial comments by the experts whether we want to ask certain questions, if that's permissible?
[break]
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Thank you Mr. Chairman. We just have a few brief questions. All of the questions - for all the questions, any of the experts are welcome to respond. We've noted in some instances that one or more of the experts have focused on the particular question we directed initially to them.
The first question we have is a request for clarification from Mr. Taylor on his introductory comments. With respect to the differences in sorption that you have noted for durable commodities we want to just clarify that those differences have been observed on a commodity by commodity basis.
Mr. Taylor
Yes, certainly, on a commodity by commodity basis, yes, the differences are there although some commodities are so similar that certainly for practical purposes commodities are often grouped together. As I say, for practical purposes certain cereals may be grouped together and then other different types of commodities - so that there may be five or six different groups, yes.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
But the observed differences have not been on a variety basis but on a commodity basis?
Mr. Taylor
You're exactly right, yes. And in fact, I've never even heard anybody raise the subject of varieties of rice or wheat or maize requiring to be examined in as much as there might be some differences. So, no, it is merely on a commodity by commodity basis.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Thank you. Also, one or two enquires with regard to the differences in sorption that you have noticed between commodities, durable commodities. Have the magnitude of those differences been obvious?
Mr. Taylor
Oh yes, yes certainly. The work that was done probably many, many years ago, perhaps even I think before I became involved in this topic, I think maybe even in the 1950s, a lot of work was done and certainly the differences were very obvious to the extent that fumigations carried out at a particular dosage would certainly not control insects to the level required if those same dosage rates were used on perhaps the next group of commodities where the level of sorption was considerably higher. So, yes I think this has been well documented and, as I say, there's a lot of evidence in the literature going back to the 1950s and '60s to substantiate this.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Thank you. The next question we'd like to direct initially at Dr. Heather. Because of the presence of other uncontrollable sources of variation in small scale tests, we don't think that it's possible to conclude that the differences in CxT values referred to by Japan are attributable or can be attributed to varietal differences affecting efficacy of treatment. However, regardless of the source of these variations, were the variations in CxT large enough to affect the efficacy of the fumigation treatments for the commodities that have been raised in this proceeding?
Dr. Heather
I find it difficult to give a precise, clear answer on that. The problem, � I think I just better leave it at that please.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
The next question we note is similar to one that the Panel will shortly be asking but we would like to come at the issue from a slightly different perspective. And that is with regard to the Panel's additional Question 3, Japan refers to various sources of fruit variation including temperature, moisture, daylight, rainfall, cultivation conditions and other natural conditions of the harvest year and Japan states that these sources of variation, quote, are not widely known to result in significant differences in efficacy of treatment, and this question is for Dr. Ducom initially. Are varietal differences, quote, widely known to result in differences in efficacy of treatment?
Dr. Ducom
Could you repeat please?
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
We note that Japan has referred to a number of sources of fruit variation which include temperature, moisture, daylight, rainfall, cultivation conditions and other natural conditions of the harvest year, and Japan states that it has not considered these sources of variation because, quote, they are not widely known to result in significant differences in efficacy of treatment. And my question is are varietal differences widely known to result in significant differences in efficacy of treatment?
Dr. Ducom
It's the same. My opinion is that differences are of the same [nature], maybe, of the same amount [importance]. I mean, I do not understand what Japan says. I mean why temperature, moisture and so on? Since they are not known they are counted for nothing. That I cannot understand. The same thing for variety. If we use the same argument varieties [aren't more significant than other variables] are just nothing because [we have little data for varieties] we don't know the answer for varieties. Or, if we take into account variety we should take into account daylight, moisture, rainfall and so on.
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Thank you. I would like to first ask whether any of the experts have had a chance to review the study on apples which Japan recently submitted in Exhibit 36. This only came in last Friday so I'm not sure whether you have had a chance, but before asking my question I want to find out whether any of you have had an opportunity to review that study?
Dr. Ducom
Which one?
Chairman
Could you repeat the number of the exhibit?
United States (Mr. Hirsh)
Sure. It's Exhibit 36. It was submitted, I believe, last Friday together with Japan's comments on Mr. Taylor's responses.
