U.S. Food Exports

Five Countries' Standards and Procedures for Testing Pesticide Residues Gao ID: NSIAD-91-90 December 20, 1990

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on: (1) U.S. efforts to prevent or resolve trade disputes over pesticide use; (2) four Pacific Rim countries' and Australia's procedures for setting tolerance levels and testing for pesticides on U.S.-exported produce; and (3) those foreign governments' technical capabilities for pesticide testing.

GAO found that: (1) the United States made such multilateral, bilateral, and administrative efforts as establishing ad hoc technical working groups and task forces to resolve foreign countries' pesticide concerns; (2) the potential for trade disputes remained due to most foreign countries' lack of information on U.S. pesticide use; (3) Australia, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand set tolerance levels for a number of pesticides, but conducted pesticide testing less routinely than the United States and had varying monitoring standards and procedures; and (4) the five countries conducted pesticide residue testing at technically capable laboratories, but their use of various testing methods could contribute to variations in test results.

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