Bill, Thank you for this informative email. You seem to have confirmed most of my guesses. The existence of an MOU is news to me. Since MOUs don't depend on the signers still being alive to remain in effect, then the USDA/USPS MOU should still be the rule used for all foreign plant material sent via the foreign government's mail service. It doesn't matter that it is so old, each PIS can't implement their own interpretation but are instead supposed to abide by the MOU. (In fact, I think they're legally required to abide by the MOU.) The Treaty of Berne does not apply to private carriers in either country. So I completely understand that plant material and seeds sent via non-governmental companies do not have to comply with the treaty requirements to get the package to its final destination without charging additional for the transport from the PIS to the final recipient. But unless the 1919 MOU was revoked at some point, mail sent via the governmental postal services (which is the case for almost all the seeds I've ordered or traded from overseas) must be delivered to the final recipient without any additional charges to the recipient or the sender. We're talking about a treaty signed and ratified by the federal government and according to the U.S. Constitution, that becomes part of the law of the land. I would love to have a copy of that MOU and also have a copy sent to the Hawthorne PIS so they would know what is required of them. If some other, private, carrier was used to transport the package, then I fully agree with you that I should also pay for the additional domestic postage from the PIS to my house, or drive over there to pick it up myself. Something I don't quite understand is why Customs or whoever, despite not having sufficient staff to inspect every incoming package (how does Australia do it I wonder?), certainly should find it very easy to pull out every package and envelope with the green and yellow label on it and deliver them to the PIS instead of to the other final destination address, should that be written on the package. If not, they could certainly be easily educated to do so since the package has to be delivered to *some* address! If it were a requirement that the green and yellow label had to be affixed right next to the final destination address, it should be an extremely easy matter to deliver all such packages to the PIS first without any additional manpower required. Then according to the treaty, and not some mere MOU, the USPS would be obligated to finish delivering the package after inspection to its final destination with no additional charges. It seems to me a new MOU could be signed where Customs or whoever is required to deliver all incoming packages that have a green and yellow label next to the final destination address to the nearest PIS *first*. As you mention, I do not want other taxpayers to have to pay for additional shipping charges for something I am purchasing. However, since the solution to this kind of problem was hammered out more than 100 years ago, I'd like to take advantage of that treaty and only pay for postage once. It seems the suggestion I described in the previous paragraph would be a perfectly reasonable and simple method to comply with all the requirements of both the USDA and the USPS while also not having to lose the benefits of the treaty either. I guess I'm mystified that this is such a problem for us in the U.S. It appears that most other countries I know about, seem to have a system in place that is much more straightforward and simple, and they don't require all this 19th Century need for paying separate postage for each leg of an international package's trip to its final destination. Anyway, thanks Bill, for explaining what goes on right now. But really this problem should have and could have been easily fixed by now, without having to make it so difficult for the individuals using the import system. I am totally in favor of following the rules. I just wish that reasonable rules would be put in place. There are a lot of really smart people in the USDA; they should have been able to get this working at least as well as the Australians and others have by now. --Lee Poulsen Pasadena, California, USDA Zone 10a WDA wrote: > It's not my intent to just discuss importation but with temps in the 20's there are not to many bulbs in my yard to report out on. Since this is a topic that I deal with daily, and often to try and resolve importer's issues I will try to shed some light on the current postage issue and impact to imports. > > Several years ago- I believe around 1919, USDA and the postal service entered into an MOU, The postal service agreed in the best interest of the country that plant shipments sent by USPS could be removed from their service agreement, inspected by USDA and returned to the system. The MOU is still in place but both the USDA and USPS has changed a bit since then. Back then USDA was the major importer of foreign plants both for experimental and evaluation purposes. I could be wrong about the actual date. It was however before I was born. I have a copy somewhere in my files I read a couple of years ago. > > Over the past 5 years We've been trying to deal with small carriers and their fee for service industry. We have several agreements and were are still trying to hammer out policy. > > >