UNCLAS MANILA 002260

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

STATE FOR EAP/MTS
STATE PASS USTR FOR DKATZ
USDA FOR APHIS JLEMLY, LALFALLA, MFLEMING, RCAPLEN

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: ECON ETRD EAGR PREL ASEAN RP
SUBJECT: Philippines Confirms Participation in APHIS Phytosanitary
Program

REF: STATE 90811


1. On July 3, EconOff presented reftel demarche and talking points
to Segfredo Serrano, Undersecretary for Policy and Planning at the
Department of Agriculture. Serrano confirmed the attendance of Joel
Rudinas, Director of the Bureau of Plant Industry, and Larry Lacson,
Chief of Plant Quarantine, at the APHIS phytosanitary workshop in Ho
Chi Minh City. He said that the Philippines does not have
regulations governing irradiation for phytosanitary quarantine
purposes, but that the participants will bring to the workshop a
Department of Health regulation on the irradiation of food.


2. Serrano said that there are no private or government irradiation
facilities in the Philippines. The Department of Agriculture has
one ongoing project, funded by USDA, at the Philippine Nuclear
Research Institute that focuses upon the effects of irradiation on
mangoes. The project uses Cobalt 60 equipment.


3. Serrano also stated that the GRP would be open to signing a
generic Framework Equivalency Working Plan, but that at the workshop
it will raise several concerns about provisions in the reftel
nonpaper. In particular, he noted that the Bureau of Plant
Industry's testing indicates that a generic dose of 400 grays of
ionizing energy destroys mangoes, and proposes that the standard
dose be 300 grays.

Kenney