[NHCOLL-L:5410] Re: [PERMIT-L] Sending specimens to China

[Doug Yanega]

>She specifically wanted to know what sort of materials these are and 
>which countries have been requesting such paperwork.  I have only 
>come across two - China and Brazil.  Has anyone else had such 
>paperwork requested from other countries?  If so, please let me know 
>so that I can forward on a detailed description to her.

We have had vials of ethanol-preserved millipede specimens sent to 
Italy held up by inspectors there who insisted upon veterinary 
certification declaring the material to be disease-free; it took 
nearly two months before they released the material. Colleagues have 
had similar problems sending material to Germany, and IIRC it was 
mentioned some time back on one of these two mailing lists that there 
were new regulations for all the E.U. countries requiring veterinary 
certification for any shipments of animal material, but that 
enforcement of these regulations was unpredictable.

Another colleague once suggested to me that we collectively boycott 
all countries that apply veterinary regulations to scientific 
specimens, but this obviously would never work; the regulating 
agencies are not going to listen to a handful of museum scientists 
when they perceive these rules to be essential to protect their 
agricultural industry (and even if they could be persuaded, we're 
talking about several years to make any changes - in the meanwhile, 
research grinds to a halt). If, as Ellen says, someone is making 
money off the issuance of permits, that reduces the likelihood of 
being granted exemption even more. I personally have a hard time 
imagining any reasonable long-term solution short of a global 
international treaty (rather than one country at a time) in 
conjunction with some sort of certification of qualified research 
institutions (to prevent abuse of the system by poachers, etc.).

Peace,
-- 

Doug Yanega        Dept. of Entomology         Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California, Riverside, CA 92521-0314        skype: dyanega
phone: (951) 827-4315 (standard disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's)
              http://cache.ucr.edu/~heraty/yanega.html
   "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
         is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82