8 



Mr. Lee. It is my pleasure to appear before the committee today 

 to discuss a proposal of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Ani- 

 mal and Plant Health Inspection Service to establish guidelines for 

 the importation of logs and lumber. This is an issue of emerging 

 importance to APHIS and the American public, and one that 

 sparks fairly intense debate among the number of interested par- 

 ties, including scientists, environmental organizations, and timber- 

 related industries. 



Mr. Rose. What other groups does it spark intense debate 

 among? You left out certain ones, I realize, but. 



Mr. Lee. The environmental groups. 



Mr. Rose. I got that; scientists, environmental groups and tim- 

 ber-related, but what other groups? 



Mr. Lee. The scientists generally at State departments of for- 

 estry, academia, those are the groups that have a large interest in 

 the topic. 



Mr. Rose. Well, I am assuming that they are all the ones that 

 are concerned about the infestations that may come along with the 

 logs. I am assuming there is another side. To have a debate you 

 need two sides. What is the other side? 



Mr. Lee. The other side is the industry-related products that 

 have the interest in the importations. 



Mr. Rose. All right. Go ahead, sir. 



Mr. Lee. With the time that I have before you, I would like to 

 explain the history and rationale behind the regulations and to in- 

 clude the effects that they could have on the agricultural and forest 

 health if those regulations as proposed are approved. 



To begin, I would like to provide a brief s3niopsis of the events 

 that led to the development of the regulations. 



The U.S. is rich in forest resources and because of this, we his- 

 torically have imported only very small quantities of foreign logs 

 and lumber. Most of these imports have come from parts of Can- 

 ada, where the climatic and pest conditions are quite similar to our 

 own. Therefore, there was no need for regulations governing the 

 importation of wood from distant countries where exotic forest 

 pests of concern exist. 



However, in the late 1980s several complex environmental, eco- 

 nomic, and strategic forces combined to reduce the amount of har- 

 vestable timber in this country, while, at the same time, timber re- 

 sources and supplies worldwide were on an increase. 



Siberia was one of the first of several regions to express an inter- 

 est in supplying the U.S. timber industry with raw wood. We 

 agreed to allow log shipments in on a trial basis to determine what 

 pest problems might be associated with the wood. We worked very 

 closely with the States of California, Washington, and Oregon to 

 evaluate the two test shipments of the Siberian logs that were au- 

 thorized. Our inspection detected a number of pests in the un- 

 treated bark and the wood that could have been harmful to our for- 

 ests. 



Concern over the pest risk associated with the test shipments 

 prompted APHIS to ask the Forest Service to conduct a detailed 

 pest risk assessment on Siberian larch. Scientific experts frorn a 

 wide range of institutions and disciplines participated in the risk 

 assessment. The results of this assessment indicated that a high 



