Dan S. asked: " The cousin would like to export orchids to the U.S. from Vietnam, but he has no idea of what he will need to do to effect this export to the U.S....Are there things that this cousin would watch out for on the Vietnam side of the transaction?"
Dan, I assume you are talking about importing orchid species rather than hybrids, and plants rather than flasks, since the rules are different for each type of import, and Vietnam doesn't have either a hybrid industry or a flasking capability worth breaking sweat over. The answer to your query is very simple; in addition to any US requirements (which I'm not going to bother with) your cousin will need CITES permits from the Vietnamese authorities. He won't get them. The Vietnamese authorities have not issued any CITES documents for orchids for many, many, many years, and have no intention of changing their stance on this matter. They won't issue CITES permits for plants collected by legitimate permit-holding scientists who they have authorised and encouraged in advance, so they certainly won't issue to capitalist lackeys for the purposes of self-enrichment at the expense of Vietnam's natural botanic resources. You will probably get told that other people have managed to export Viet species to the USA recently. This is true ... they have, and are still doing so. Since these shipments have not been impounded on arrival in the USA, they must be accompanied by some reasonably convincing documentation. All I can say with total certainty is that these documents were not issued legitimately by the correct CITES authority in Vietnam. OK ? Peter O'Byrne in Singapore _______________________________________________ the OrchidGuide Digest (OGD) orchids@orchidguide.com http://orchidguide.com/mailman/listinfo/orchids_orchidguide.com
