Borate treatment has the potential to provide termite resistance to Canadian lumber destined for use as sill plates in Japanese houses. Performance data is a prerequisite for approval of such a product by Japanese Codes and Standards authorities. Forintek therefore proposed a collaborative (University of Hawaii/University of Kyoto/Forintek Canada Corporation) field test of Canadian softwood lumber treated with borates. The first step in the procedure was to design and evaluate a suitable test method. With partial funding from the Japan Science and Technology Fund such a preliminary field test is now underway in Hawaii and Japan and is largely on schedule. However a one year delay in the Japanese portion of the test has resulted from the collaborator omitting to use bait stakes in the test termite bait stakes. Western hemlock sill plates (dodai) have been treated with both low and high levels of borate wood preservative, and, together with untreated wood, installed in a simulated sill plate field test at both sites. After five months, attack of untreated wood was demonstrated in the Japanese test in those replicates where termite bait stakes were used. In Hawaii, attack is prevalent on both controls and low-level-boron treated wood. Although not yet fully evaluated the test method appears to be successful. The main test is scheduled to begin later in 1994.