JAPAN – MEASURES AFFECTING AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS
Document: Communication from Japan and the United States
Date: 30 August 2001
Document codes: WT/DS76/12
Complainant: U.S.
Respondent: Japan
Third parties: Brazil, EU, Hungary
Dispute stage: Mutually Agreed Solution
Agreements cited: Art. 2, 4, 5, 7  Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS)Art. XI  GATT 1994Art. 4  AgricultureArt. 8  Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS)

JAPAN – MEASURES AFFECTING AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS
Communication from Japan and the United States
The following communication, dated 23 August 2001, from the Permanent Mission of Japan
and the Permanent Mission of the United States to the Chairman of the Dispute Settlement Body is
circulated at the request of these delegations.
The Governments of Japan and the United States of America wish to notify the Dispute
Settlement Body (DSB) that they have reached a mutually satisfactory solution regarding the matters
raised by the United States in "" (WT/DS76) with
respect to conditions for lifting import prohibitions on the fruits and nuts at issue in the dispute
(covered products). Accordingly, the United States and Japan consider that Article 21.6 of the
Understanding on Rules and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Disputes no longer requires that
this item remain on the agenda of the DSB.
We confirm that Japan is modifying the rules governing the conditions for lifting import
prohibitions on the covered products. The import prohibitions, and the conditions for lifting the bans,
are intended to prevent the introduction to Japan of the pest codling moth through imports of the
covered products. The principal features of the modifications are as follows:
1. Japan eliminated on 31 December 1999 the varietal testing requirements described in the
Panel Report () (e.g. paras. 2.22-2.24), as well as the "Experimental Guide for Cultivar
Comparison Test on Insect Mortality – Fumigation", which sets forth those requirements. This was
notified to the DSB by the letter dated 10 January 2000 from Ambassador Koichi Haraguchi
addressed to the Chairman of the DSB.
2. Import bans on the covered products will be lifted upon implementation of methodologies
agreed upon between an exporting country and Japan. Such methodologies may include quarantine
treatments which provide for measurement of gas concentrations to ensure that these concentrations
achieve reference levels identified during the deve lopment of the treatment. They may also include
comparisons of gas concentration data for different varieties of a product to confirm that they are
comparable.
3. Quarantine treatments developed for the varieties of covered products for which Japan's
import ban has already been lifted conditioned upon application of those treatments may continue to
be applied to those varieties.

The above modifications are without prejudice to the rights and obligations of the
United States and Japan under the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization,
and are not intended to prejudge the positions of the United States and Japan on the interpretation of
those rights and obligations.
(s) Linnet F. Deily (s) Koichi Haraguchi
Ambassdor Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary
Permanent Representative of the Permanent Representative of
United States to the WTO Japan to the WTO