Does anybody know how slow Canadian pstal service is?

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My Ginseng was confiscated by customs and will be 'disposed of'. My first true experience with CITES.... It is a pain in the ass! and I am only dealing with appendix II species too! I had written two letters already, even asking the ginseng returned to the USA, but the officer still refused. I don't know what else to write. I think his response is pathetic and he just keeps sending me the website to CITES after each response and repeats I must have a permit.
I think I must find a way to get a change with these dumb policies

Hien you have your bowl right?
 
My Ginseng was confiscated by customs and will be 'disposed of'. My first true experience with CITES.... It is a pain in the ass! and I am only dealing with appendix II species too! I had written two letters already, even asking the ginseng returned to the USA, but the officer still refused. I don't know what else to write. I think his response is pathetic and he just keeps sending me the website to CITES after each response and repeats I must have a permit.
I think I must find a way to get a change with these dumb policies

Hien you have your bowl right?

For Panax ginseng, either it is the fake ginseng ( Panax qinquefolius), or only the Panax ginseng coming from the Federation of russia. For those, only the roots alone are concened... See www.cites.org
 
My Ginseng was confiscated by customs and will be 'disposed of'. My first true experience with CITES.... It is a pain in the ass! and I am only dealing with appendix II species too! I had written two letters already, even asking the ginseng returned to the USA, but the officer still refused. I don't know what else to write. I think his response is pathetic and he just keeps sending me the website to CITES after each response and repeats I must have a permit.
I think I must find a way to get a change with these dumb policies

Hien you have your bowl right?

Yes, I got it.
Exactly as Shaun mentioned, After I received it, I went on the Canadian postal service website to check. It still says the package is processing.
 
From the CITES Canada website:
-----
CITES Appendix II
Specimen imported into Canada must be accompanied by export permit

The exportation of cultivated American ginseng (Panax quinquefolius) always requires a Canadian CITES export permit issued by the Canadian Wildlife Service. The requirement for CITES permits applies only to live ginseng plants and to whole and sliced ginseng roots and parts of ginseng roots.
-------

Fren, I'm not sure if it is fair to blame the Canada Customs or Canadian Wildlife Services for confiscating your ginseng if it was exported without a proper permit. :poke: And even if it was sent with a vague label, the dogs can easily sniff out packages that contains plant and animal products.. :poke:
 
I've read alot about the troubles spent shipping things between Canada and USA, why are the regulations so high and take so long?
 
I placed an order with a Canadian grower and was assured there would be no problems with CITEs as they will deal with all the paper work, being "fully certified". It should be interesting as the plants I ordered are all flask grown plants scheduled Appendix I. So, it's a crap shoot as to whether the plants will be allowed in, even though technically they are legal.

Wish me luck, I know I'll need it.

Sorry to hear about the ginseng. It's issues like this that remind me how faulty CITES is, despite its great intentions. But then again, we all know where the road paved with good intentions leads.
 
I'm glad that you got your bowl Hien.:)

What is frustrating is that CITES does not differentiate between wild collected and cultivated plants. In response to my second letter, he wrote that my ginseng had to be certitfied as cultivated, and nobody usually goes to a chinese herbal store asking for this certification (at least to my knowledge). I feel like writing a third letter though I know this is a one sided debate, he is in control no matter what I write. The officer is just strictly following the policies, and even though reasoning in my letters was rational.

I do have a package of wild collected ginseng, and the roots do not look the same as the others, though I am not an expert on whether it is the same species or why they look so different. And my mom seems to know what is good stuff visually...

BTW, this ginseng would have been fine if they were handcarried, according to the officer in the first letter (in response to the note attached to the receipt from the vendor stating that 10lb is allowed for import). Makes no sense to me what the diff between mailing and hand harrying, the end result is the same.

My aunt had no bad intentions in sending the material and it was not a attempted smuggle as she did not know. The package remains confiscated and could not be dispatched back to my aunt, again using permits for his reasoning. ...My dad doesn't care anymore, some reason I still have the drive to get the ginseng back

There will always be a demand and trade for orchids or ginseng, etc. I will have to write to someone (maybe my Member of Parliament?) about these extremist conservation policies eventually....they are not helping anyone, as most of us are aware, especially when so many good people are spending years to cultivate the plants when they could be illegally harvested. we need change, getting permits is costly for small imports and annoying. It's going to be tough though.
 
It's been my experience that when it comes to the government, btw this will be a generalization, logic and reason very rarely enter into their decisions. It's similar to the old saying that, " a court of law is no place to ever seek the truth." I feel sad that it seems to me that the only way anyone will ever listen to us orchid folks, and ginseng folks, is if we donate huge sums of money to politicians.

It's my feeling that CITES, no matter how well intentioned, is a body comprised of politically motivated people who are only out there to tell the side their government wants them to tell, and they do this for their own personal gain. Damn the truth. So, who benefits from all this? I would be interested to see the money trail, someone in a high place benefits from keepig the little guys from getting the plants.

Sorry about the rant, I just woke up and I'm afraid it was on the "wrong side of the bed". Hey, I even have a brother in law who is a Customs agent, but he doesn't count toward my diatribe. LOL ;)
 
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