restrictions on apples in june 2008 china noted that it had submitted an application to export apples to the united states accompanied by the necessary technical materials. additional materials had been provided in accordance with the us requirements on pest risk analysis. however the us pest risk analysis had been unduly delayed. china was free of fruit flies in apple planting areas and it used fruit-bagging techniques to prevent pests and disease infections as the bagged fruits were totally isolated from the environment. china was also free of fire blight and there were no quarantine risks for chinese apples. furthermore china had provided all the technical materials requested by the united states and had held bilateral technical consultations with the competent authorities. however the us pest risk analysis on chinese apples had still not been completed after ten years. china urged the united states to complete the relevant procedures as soon as possible. the united states noted that given the significant number of pests of quarantine significance that needed to be addressed in chinas request the pest risk assessment had proven to be challenging. the united states had been seeking to finalize the list of apple pests in china since 2004. dozens of pests of potential quarantine significance had been identified. a final list of pests needed to be developed in order to evaluate the risks associated with chinese apples and to identify the appropriate mitigations measures. the united states would continue to work on this issue to address the scientific matters associated with the risk assessment. in october 2008 china reported that it had submitted an application for the export of apples to the united states in 1998 with the necessary technical materials for a pest risk analysis. however the process of pest risk analysis had been delayed for more than ten years with the claim of repeated technical problems. this had seriously impeded the export of chinese apples. chinese apples had similar production areas disease and pest occurrences and regulations as pears in china. the united states allowed the importation of pears based on a risk assessment. this showed that there should not be any quarantine problem for chinese apples to be exported to the united states. the united states reported that since 2004 it had sought to finalize the list of apple pests of china. however more scientific information was needed from the chinese authorities to know whether some pests occurred in areas of china where apple production was concentrated. in february 2009 the representative of china indicated that although there had been technical discussions on this subject there had been no progress. china remained concerned about undue delays in the pest risk assessment process. china was free of fire blight and fruit flies in the apple-growing regions. in addition fruit bagging was used so there was no quarantine risk. chinese apples had similar production areas diseases pest occurrences and regulations as pears in china. the united states had allowed importation of pears based on a risk assessment so there should be no quarantine problem for apples. china indicated that according to article 5.7 a risk assessment should be carried out within a reasonable period of time and asked the united states to complete its assessment as soon as possible. the representative of the united states indicated a willingness to continue working with china to address the scientific issues related to the market access request for chinese apples. the united states had identified an extensive list of quarantine pests associated with apples from china which made the risk assessment a challenging task. in addition the united states was reviewing the information provided on the pests of concern to determine whether it provided a clear and complete scientific understanding of the pest situation and was awaiting additional information from china. for