Copyright © 1996, Good Fruit Grower
New, biological pest and disease controls may be
easier to register in the United States than conventional pesticides, but that
may not be the case in certain export markets. 
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a
fast-track registration process for biological controls that is less costly than
the standard registration process, enabling the industry to adopt rapidly new
types of controls. "We have to
realize that in export markets that may not be the case," Dr. Wally Ewart,
vice president for scientific affairs with the Northwest Horticultural Council,
said at the Washington Tree Fruit Postharvest Conference in March. For example, some producers are using Bio-Save
products, which are biofungicides produced by EcoScience. Bio- Save 10 and 11
are based on naturally-occurring bacteria isolated from fruit surfaces. The
products can be applied to apples and pears as postharvest treatments to control
blue mold and gray mold, as alternatives to the fungicide thiabendazole (TBZ).
In Japan, postharvest products must be
registered as food additives, rather than pesticides, a process that is handled
by the Ministry of Health. Pesticide registrations are handled by the Ministry
of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. Apple
producers shipping to Japan have not been able to use TBZ as a postharvest
treatment because it is not registered as a food additive, despite the fact that
it is registered in Japan for preharvest useÐand at levels many times higher
than the trace amounts likely to be found on fruit from postharvest
applications, Ewart said. Rather than go through the complicated process of
seeking a food additive registration for TBZ, packers have chosen not to treat
the fruit. Ewart said EcoScience has
explored the possibility of registering its Bio-Save products in Japan but
concluded that also would be a long and difficult process. He said the fact that
they are derived from bacteria raises phytosanitary issues, even though they are
not disease-causing organisms. Japan
defers to the international Codex standards in cases where it does not have its
own standards, but obtaining a Codex registration is also very costly and
difficult (see ...Codex Article). "As we implement more and more biological
materials, we may have this come up," Ewart said. "Other countries may
not accept them quickly enough, and the Codex process is too slow to get in
place by the time we want to use them."