Importing dried herbs - email from Department of Agriculture

[squidgygoanna]

Hey guys.

 

I sent an email to the Department of Agriculture to find out the legal status of Pedicularis Densiflora, Picralima Nitida, and Glaucium Flavum.

I've never been able to find out for sure if importing dried material from these particular plants is allowed despite scouring the internet, and found nothing in the BICON tool for any of them.

 

I received the following response from DOA. Would you guys interpret this to mean that importation of these particular dried herbs is allowed?

Dried herbs for human consumption will no longer require an import permit as soon as 17 October. A BICON alert has already been published in BICON to inform the publish of this change. The import requirements for dried herbs can be summarised as follows:

·         All herbs that have been thoroughly dried can be imported into Australia

·         Goods must be commercially prepared, labelled and packaged.

·         An ingredient list must be provided with botanical names or common names

·         Goods must be inspected on arrival to verify that they have been thoroughly dried

[Yeti101]

Was just about to reply to your other thread on this plant - no, I don't believe that either herb or seeds are widely available in Oz. Very interesting that P. densiflora doesn't come up in BICON - might be able to import the seeds after all! (maybe). Will have to run some of my african wish-list through this.

[Insequent]

Hey Squidgy.

 

The way I read what you received from DOA, it makes a blanket reference to non scheduled herbs for human consumption.  I know both Indian Warrior and Glaucium Flavum are available to purchase in OZ, so they should be fine.  Picralima Nitida might be a different matter given it's an opioid and related to Kratom. I believe Kratom remains illegal.

 

Yellow poppy seed... http://eastseedfarm.ecrater.com.au/filter.php?cid=0&keywords=Glaucium+Flavum&x=27&y=10

Indian Warrior... http://eastseedfarm.ecrater.com.au/p/16802842/5g-pedicularis-densiflora-10x-extract

 

Can find no-one selling Picralima Nitida.

 

This was interesting....

http://happyherbcompany.com/we-won-plants-exempt-new-ban  (Dec. 2015)

 

...The psychoactive substances import bill was passed by the Federal government on Monday after accepting the amendment that the Happy Herb Company lobbied for, which is to exclude all plant material and plant extracts from the ban. 

 

This is a big win for herbalists, ethnobotanical collectors, ethnic Australians and plant enthusiasts  who otherwise would have been prohibited from importing a range of awesome herbs such as Kanna, Guayusa, Sinicuichi, Indian Warrior, Blue Lily and many more. It's the third time in 4 years HHC has managed to have an impact on state and federal legislation to protect plants and the people that use them. 

 

This time around we made a lengthy submission and presented a witness to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee, making the basic point that "of the estimated 4 million species of plants on Earth, there exist countless non-addictive herbs that are considered beneficial to human health.

Of these, vast numbers exhibit mild psychoactivity along with negligible or non-existent adverse health effects. However a great deal of these substances have not yet been listed by existing Therapeutic Goods Administration or Food Standards ANZ Act regulations; thus they would be illegal to import under the new law. Undertaking the studies necessary to add to the list of TGA regulated botanicals would be prohibitively expensive for virtually anyone outside of large pharmaceutical corporations." 

 

And the politicians agreed!

.

 

The gang at HHC have been doing some good work putting pressure on the fuckenment.

 

Hope this helps.

 

 

 

[squidgygoanna]

Cheers Insequent! I scoured the interwebs for hours trying to find a vendor for P. Densiflora powder and had no luck! guess I must have skipped over this one. I had some G. Flavum seed but could never get it to germinate. Might buy some more and give it another try