Effective May 1, 2018, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) will require USDA import permits for all live animal shipments via a land border port between Canada and Alaska.
Please note this is not a regulation change. We are enforcing our current regulations, which allow the entry of certain types of live animals from Canada without a USDA import permit if the entry is at a designated land border port as listed in 9CFR Part 93. However, there are no designated land border ports on the Canadian/United States border to Alaska. Therefore, we require all APHIS Veterinary Services (VS) regulated live animal imports from Canada to Alaska to have a USDA import permit issued prior to entry into Alaska to facilitate inspections. Live animals requiring an inspection that present at a non-designated U.S. Land Border Port without a USDA import permit will not be eligible for entry. This includes all bovine, swine, farmed cervids, ovine, caprine, domestic camelids, poultry and hatching eggs, ratites and hatching eggs, pet birds, germplasm, and permanent entry horses.
Canadian horses may enter the US temporarily without a USDA import permit, but must exit the United States by the 30th calendar day—post inspection—as listed on the health certificate (HA 1964).
The USDA import permit application (VS 17-129) may be submitted using this email address: VS.Live.Animals.Import.Permits@aphis.usda.gov.
You may also submit an application online by clicking here: https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/resources/permits/ct_eauth_epermits.
This alert does not affect those subgroups already requiring a USDA import permit for entry such as VS-regulated fish, exotic or zoo animals, and animals in transit to a third country.
Contact information for the USDA APHIS VS Northern Border Port Services may be found at the following website: https://www.aphis.usda.gov/animal_health/downloads/nies_contacts/aic-ps.pdf or email vs.nbp@aphis.usda.gov.