Anybody know the procedure for importing live corals for personal use, I have found a few places that say they will ship internationally, but would like to make sure that customs will allow them in? Looking at acquiring some Florida ricordea.
Importing Coral
- Thread starter moz
- Start date
Tagging, as I would love to buy directly from the Supplier
But where and how to get these
Hi, you get the CITES from nature conservation and the import permits from dept of agriculture.
Those permits are not cheap and not easy to come by. You will need the CITES for all hard corals.
Then there is shipping.... and normally it's not worthwhile to bring in small quantities
Those permits are not cheap and not easy to come by. You will need the CITES for all hard corals.
Then there is shipping.... and normally it's not worthwhile to bring in small quantities
If the local Lfs brings in 03 boxes every couple of months, then surely I can (maybe with someones help) get a couple of boxes imported. Even if it is only a couple of boxes once off or maybe twice. I remember he mentioned that it was about three or four thousand per box. I only want it for personal use, not for resale
Did some quick research while burning
my supper.
Cites listed corals are of the families;
Antipatharia
Helioporacea
Scleractinia
Stolonifera
Ricordeidae is not CITES listed so permit is most likely not needed.
The Department of Agriculture Permit for the Authorization to import
an animal (assuming that Dep Agriculture know that corals are animals)and/or genetic material into the Republic of South Africa is either R159 or R205 per application, depending on which publication you read.
my supper.Cites listed corals are of the families;
Antipatharia
Helioporacea
Scleractinia
Stolonifera
Ricordeidae is not CITES listed so permit is most likely not needed.
The Department of Agriculture Permit for the Authorization to import
an animal (assuming that Dep Agriculture know that corals are animals)and/or genetic material into the Republic of South Africa is either R159 or R205 per application, depending on which publication you read.
Hi all - also did some research on this a while back - here's what I found:
1) You can get the import permit, IF you list the following:
- company name (which you importing from) and their exact address
- SARS Clearance certificate
- complete list of the life stock you want to import - both english AND scientific names (full list)
- International Airport where the shipment is being sent from
- R225 permit cost (valid for 3 months)
2) Then, you can place your order, and they MUST send you an invoice
- this invoice, together with your import permit, AND complete list of life stock being imported must be sent to the Dept of Agriculture before the shipment reaches your local aitport
- you also require a bill of entry / bill of shipment from the supplier, for the Dept of Agriculture
ONLY once you have ALL these (and even before you have the shipment sent), you need to contact the certain lady at the Dept of Agriculture, with your list of life-stock, and they will supply a CITES permit for you (or tell you you don't require it).....
This process takes about 2 - 3 weeks....
1) You can get the import permit, IF you list the following:
- company name (which you importing from) and their exact address
- SARS Clearance certificate
- complete list of the life stock you want to import - both english AND scientific names (full list)
- International Airport where the shipment is being sent from
- R225 permit cost (valid for 3 months)
2) Then, you can place your order, and they MUST send you an invoice
- this invoice, together with your import permit, AND complete list of life stock being imported must be sent to the Dept of Agriculture before the shipment reaches your local aitport
- you also require a bill of entry / bill of shipment from the supplier, for the Dept of Agriculture
ONLY once you have ALL these (and even before you have the shipment sent), you need to contact the certain lady at the Dept of Agriculture, with your list of life-stock, and they will supply a CITES permit for you (or tell you you don't require it).....
This process takes about 2 - 3 weeks....
A bit of a mission don't you think? Could you guys not ask your LFS to bring in the stuff you want with their shipment?
Dep of Agri culture has offices at all the international airports with various inspectors.... i dont think corals inspectors is one of them
Funny Henk
The problem is that a some of the LFS get their stock from only a few sources, most not in the Atlantic.
Spoke to my LFS on Saterday, about Florida ricordea which is what I was looking at importing, and he said that he could possibly get them, he just never thought that anybody would be willing to pay the rather high cost per polyp.
Sean the local shop you talking about only gets from kenya. There is a new shop in Empangeni that says he is getting in marine's so when his stuff arrives I'll let you know if it's anygood then we can place orders for more...
I hope they do Shaun, as a couple of shops have said before that they'll start stocking, but up to now-Nothing.
Where are you on the 14th????
Sean even though your local LFS only gets in 3 boxes they probably still go through one of the bigger importers to get the stuff. Importing stuff is a huge mission, seriously not worth it. Moz, just ask your LFS to get. Ricordea florida isn't that rare.
Funny Henk
dude you should have seen them when we import plants.... i mean its like a list of 50plants on the invoice and a black list of plants thats like 3 pages long... the guys had no idea which plant is which when he open boxes.... they just check that its not boxes of cocain....
