Annex

NPPO requirements:

The exporting NPPO will ensure that pre-shipment cold treatment is conducted in line with the Australian phytosanitary treatment application standard for cold treatment (Commonwealth of Australia, 2018).

The exporting NPPO will ensure that treatment details such as date, temperature, duration, and packinghouse/facility number of the cold disinfestation be included in the ‘treatment section’ on the phytosanitary certificate.

Cool rooms:

Cool rooms must be permanent structures with appropriate temperature monitoring and phytosanitary security in place. Cool rooms must be able to:

• accommodate the required number of probes.
• record and store data for the period of the treatment and then until the information can be examined by an officer at the exporting NPPO or person authorised by the exporting NPPO.
• record all temperature sensors at least hourly. Printouts must identify each probe, time and the temperature.
  

Calibration of temperature probes:

Calibration must be consistent with the Australian phytosanitary treatment application standard for cold treatment (2018) using a slurry of crushed ice and distilled water.

A certified thermometer approved by the exporting NPPO must be used to confirm temperature of the ice slurry is maintained at 0°C during the calibration.

Any probe which records more than ±0.3°C from 0°C must be replaced by one that meets this criterion.

When the treatment has been completed, the exporting NPPO or person authorised by the exporting NPPO will re-calibrate the fruit probes.

Number and placement of temperature probes:

Placement of probes and connection to a logger will be undertaken under the supervision of the exporting NPPO or person authorised by the exporting NPPO.

Palletised fruit must be loaded into cold rooms under the supervision of the exporting NPPO or person authorised by the exporting NPPO.

As a minimum, two probes (at the inlet and the outlet points of air circulation) to measure room temperature and minimum of four probes for measuring fruit flesh temperature must be used for each consignment.

The four probes measuring the actual fruit flesh temperature must be located as follows:

• one probe must be placed at the centre of the stack in the centre of the cold room
• one at the corner of the top stack in the centre of the cold room
• one at the centre of the stack near the outlet of cold air, and
• one at the corner of the top stack near the outlet of cold air.
  

Progressive review of treatments:

Treatment time will be deemed to have commenced only after all probes have attained the nominated treatment temperature.

Where only the minimum number of probes (4) have been used, and in the event that any probe fails to record a temperature for a period of more than four consecutive hours, the treatment will be declared void and must be started again.

If the record of treatment indicates that the treatment parameters have been met then the NPPO may authorise cessation of the treatment and if the probes pass re-calibration, then the treatment will be considered to have been successfully completed.

All fruit probes must be re-calibrated and treatment confirmed before the fruit is moved from the treatment room.

Confirmation of treatment:

Calibration records must be kept for the Australian NPPO.

If any probe shows a higher calibration reading at the completion of the treatment than at the initial calibration setting, the recordings from the probes will be adjusted accordingly. If the calibration reading is lower than the previous data then there is a chance that the temperature data adjusted accordingly may reveal that the nominated treatment schedule was not met. In this instance the treatment will be deemed to have failed.

The option of re-treating this fruit is at the discretion of the exporting NPPO and the exporter in the country of origin.

Temperature records must include suitable data summaries that indicate that the required cold treatment of the product has been achieved.

The exporting NPPO must endorse these records and summaries before confirming that the treatment has been successful. These are to be made available for the Australian NPPO at audit when require