Lacey Act Declaration

Illegal harvesting competes with those companies complying with the rules and regulations of legitimate trade. The Lacey Act has been around for decades battling illegal trafficking of fish, wildlife and plants. In 2008 the Lacey Act was effectively amended to extend the protection to a broader range of plants, encompassing products that are derived from illegally harvested plants and require an import declaration on any plant or plant product imported into the U.S. A phased in approach is in place based on the plant´s degree of processing and complexity of its composition. As of April 1st 2009, Phase 2 plants & plant products will require a declaration. A full list of Phase 2 plants is available on TRG's website.

Are you prepared?

Have you…

◦ identified any/all products that contain plant or plant products,

◦ prioritized products based on plant,◦ determined the original purchaser of the plant or plant material,

◦ determined the plant name, source and value to be included on Lacey declaration,

◦ worked with suppliers to included Lacey information on commercial invoices?

Lacey Act Declaration (LAD)

The declaration must be made at time of importation, and include information on:

Scientific name of any plant,

A description of the value of importation,

Quantity of the plant,

Name of the country in which the plant was harvested.

If a plant species or country of origin cannot be determined, the plant declaration must include a list of possible plant species found in the product or a list of possible countries from which the plant originated.

How will you file this additional data element?

Lacey Act Declaration Addition to TRG Direct Available at No Extra Fee

Phase 2 of the Lacey Act Amendment went into effect on April 1st. TRG Direct's Web-based U.S. Customs entry filing system was ready for this additional data at no extra charge.

Importer's filing consumption entries with TRG Direct (who are subject to the Lacey Act Amendment) were able to begin filing the LAD on April 1st. This addition to the Web-based direct filing system comes at no additional fee to the importer. Customs entries are priced at either $20 or $30 depending on the importer's volume. Thus cost remains the same even with this upgraded feature.

The Lacey Act consists of approximately 19 data elements that need to be filed with Cargo Release and Entry Summary. Cargo Release and Entry Summary already capture some of the required information. The Lacy Act (PG) data set will capture the additional data elements such as: Intended use, description, name of constituent element, quantity of constituent element, unit of measure, percent of constituent element, Participating Government Agency (PGA) line value, scientific genus name, scientific species name container number, source type and source country code.

With TRG Direct this addition has been added to the system as an OGA or Other Government Agency dropdown. It is intended to act much like an FDA regulation. TRG Direct is completely Web-based. This keeps costs down for customers when an entry requirement change is made. There is no need for the importer to engage their IT department for system upgrades. TRG Direct takes care of it all.