1 October 2015
Purpose
To advise that the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources has successfully negotiated market access for external authorised officers with Australian trading partners with whom the department has established protocol market access arrangements.
Background
The reference document, Table of horticulture protocol markets, in the Plant Exports Operations Manual, outlines established protocol market access arrangements. Using tick boxes, this reference table clearly defines which protocol markets accept an inspection performed by an external or departmental authorised officer or both officers.
Until recently, only departmental authorised officers were permitted to undertake inspections of commodities for protocol markets.
Key points
- The department has written to eight trading partners with whom Australia has negotiated protocol market access arrangements, advising that external authorised officers will commence inspecting exported protocol commodities from 1 October 2015.
- To date favourable responses from six of Australia’s protocol markets have been received. These are Korea, Taiwan, China, USA, New Zealand and Vietnam.
- The reference document, Table of horticulture protocol markets, has been updated to define which protocol markets accept an inspection performed by an external authorised officer.
- External authorised officers must refer to this table to determine which commodity/country combination they can inspect.
- A further Industry Advice Notice will be published once the department is able to establish external authorised officer access to inspect commodities for the remaining two protocol markets.
Contact Information
If you have any questions regarding this IAN please email: plant export training.
Dr Chris Parker
Assistant Secretary
Plant Export Operations Branch