13 



Ms. LORIMER. No, I think that this whole process of risk assess- 

 ment is one that is developing and is becoming extremely impor- 

 tant as time goes on, and the process that we use is one that was 

 recommended by the National Research Council. 



Mrs. Thurman. I thank you. 



Mr. Rose. All right. Mr. DeFazio, Members of the subcommittee, 

 any other questions? Mr. Volkmer, former Chairman of the sub- 

 committee. 



Mr. Volkmer. In the meantime, are we permitting any logs to 

 be imported from any of these countries? 



Mr. Lee. Yes, we are, sir. 



Mr. Volkmer. Where are they coming from? 



Mr. Lee. Chile and New Zealand. 



Mr. Volkmer. And New Zealand right now? 



Mr. Lee. Yes. 



Mr. Volkmer. And where are they coming into? 



Mr. Lee. Mostly into the ports of Seattle, in Washington. 



Mr. Volkmer. Somebody I understand in the audience said Coos 

 Bay; is that right? I see a lot of people shaking their head yes. Do 

 we not know? 



Mr. Lee. Yes, we do know; I do not know specifically. 



Mr. Volkmer. Anyway, they are coming into the Northwest? 



Mr. Lee. Yes, sir. 



Mr. Volkmer. What is happening to them when they get there? 



Mr. Lee. They are coming in under the provisions of the interim 

 rule that was published about a year ago. We do the inspection 

 that is required to follow up on the shipments that have arrived, 

 and I believe the record would indicate that we have had 12 ship- 

 ments since we published the interim rule about a year ago. 



We have not found any problems associated with those ship- 

 ments that have arrived. 



Mr. Volkmer. Now, you have not found any. How long does it 

 take to process and get the lab results back on the testing that is 

 done on the logs? 



Mr. Lee. It is a matter of days, not of weeks or months. There 

 are these particular pathogens that must be tested for and, depend- 

 ent upon the disease, that dictates the time it takes to do the anal- 

 ysis. 



Mr. Volkmer. I was wondering here because I was reading 

 something here, what is the test time? 



Mr. Lee. Depending upon the disease and the point of origin, it 

 can go up to 90 days. 



Mr. Volkmer. What happens to the logs in that time, in that 90- 

 day period? 



Mr. Lee. In some cases the logs — well, that would be a theoreti- 

 cal question, Mr. Volkmer. 



Mr. Volkmer. Let me ask you this. I have been reading a state- 

 ment here by somebody involved a little bit in this out in Oregon, 

 and I am under the impression that you have your people do the 

 boring and et cetera and get the test product and then it is taken 

 off and then the logs are released. And then, later on, you find out 

 whether there were any pests or not in them or if there is any dis- 

 ease, but the logs are already gone. Is that the procedure? 



