 The International Plant Protection Convention, IPPC. It's a multilateral treaty that facilitates global cooperation to protect plants from harmful pests, such as fruit flies. Pests that may be introduced and spread through international trade. Fruit flies present a major challenge to international trade because if they are detected in foods, trade may be stopped. That is why a set of international standards for phytosanitary measures, ISPMs on fruit flies, has been developed and recently reorganized. When a country wants to export fruit, this set of standards can facilitate the process. It starts with the standard ISPM 37 for host status, which questions, can this fruit be a host for fruit flies? In other words, if the fruit, such as coconut, is not susceptible to the fruit fly, the pest cannot infest it. It is a non-host and therefore it can proceed directly for export. But if there is the possibility of the pest infesting the fruit, then the question is whether the fruit comes from an area that is fruit fly free. If it does, then it can go for export. But if fruit flies are present in the area, then the country must apply additional phytosanitary measures to reduce the risk of fruit fly hosts introducing the pest to the importing country. This scheme is called a systems approach. In a systems approach, the exporting country applies two or more independent phytosanitary measures. The integration of these measures will reduce the risk of pests in fruit trade to levels that are acceptable to the importing country, while contributing to assuring high quality of the fruits to be exported. The phytosanitary scheme under which trade might occur is defined and agreed by the interested parties, based on ISPMs or technically justified. This is done through a bilateral agreement between the plant protection organizations of both the exporting and the importing countries. Through the implementation of the international standards for phytosanitary measures, countries protect plant resources from fruit fly pests while, at the same time, they ensure the application of justified measures that facilitate safe trade.