Step 1) Pack Food and Non-Food items separately: We strongly suggest packing food items and non-food items separately and sending each on its own House Airway Bill. It is not uncommon for Customs and FDA inspectors to hold a food shipment for document review and physical cargo examination. Often customs will release non-food shipments, such as giveaway promotional items, brochures, catalogs, etc, much faster than food items. If your food and non-food items are packed separately, and your food shipment experiences a delay, you may at least have your non-food items at your booth to exhibit while waiting for your food items to arrive. Step 2) Register as a foreign facility with the US FDA: All owners, operators, or agents in charge of foreign facilities that manufacture/process, pack, or hold food for human or animal consumption in the United States are required to register with the FDA. All foreign facilities that manufacture/process, pack, or hold food are required to register unless food from that facility undergoes further processing (including packaging) by another foreign facility before the food is exported to the United States. In that case, the last foreign facility to have contact with the food is required to do the registering. Companies can register on-line at: [url=http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~furls/ovffreg.html]www.cfsan.fda.gov/~furls/ovffreg.html[/url] Step 3) Fill out a Prior Notice of Arrival with the US FDA: In addition to the facility registration process, the Manufacturer, Exhibitor or the Origin Shipping Agent must file a Prior Notice of Arrival with US FDA. This is mandatory and must be completed before the shipment is shipped out from the country of origin. TWI must have the correct information from the origin Shipping Company in order to avoid any US FDA or US Customs problems that could occur for the clearance release process. IMPORTANT NOTE: The FDA has established the absolute minimums for Prior Notice of Arrival as follows: 4 hours if arriving to the US by air. 8 hours if arriving to the US by ocean. ---- by Greg Batulanon, Sales Representative at TWI Group, Inc. Greg has over six yearsÂ’ experience moving food items into and out of the US for international exhibitors and has been a featured speaker at the Natural Products Expo West in Anaheim. To reach Greg, or any of our experienced Sales Representatives regarding your tradeshow shipments or questions, please call our Las Vegas office at 702.691.9000.
