ISPM 15 exists to stop wood boring pests crossing borders in packaging. The risk is real and specific: untreated solid wood can carry insects that finished goods cannot. That is why the rule targets the packaging material itself: pallets, crates, boxes, blocking, bracing, and dunnage made from raw solid wood, generally pieces thicker than 6 millimetres.
The treatment is either heat treatment to a core temperature standard or approved fumigation, applied by an accredited facility, and the IPPC mark, the wheat sheaf symbol with the country, producer, and treatment codes, is the evidence. No legible mark means no evidence, and no evidence is treated as no treatment, however the supplier describes the pallet.
Manufactured wood is outside the rule: plywood, particle board, oriented strand board, and veneer based packaging were processed with heat, glue, and pressure that remove the pest risk, so a plywood crate needs no mark. Thin wood under the threshold, sawdust and shavings, and wholly exempt items like small gift style wooden articles also fall outside, but the category the supplier claims is not decisive. The construction is.
The trap is mixed packaging: a plywood crate on a solid wood pallet, goods braced with solid wood blocks inside a compliant box. The shipment is only as compliant as its worst piece, because the inspector who finds unmarked solid wood does not grade the rest of the load generously. Audit the whole packaging specification, including the pallet the goods arrive on, not just the branded outer box.
By the time a container is opened at destination, every option is expensive: treatment at the port where facilities allow it, separation of goods from packaging where permitted, or export of the whole shipment. The cheap control is a photograph of the IPPC mark on each packaging type, taken at loading, filed with the shipment documents, and checked against the standard before the container seals.
Put the requirement in the purchase specification, not in an email after the first failure. Suppliers who ship on treated, marked pallets as standard will say so immediately. Suppliers who have never been asked will load whatever pallet is nearest, and the nearest pallet at a busy factory is rarely the compliant one. A line in the spec, pallets ISPM 15 heat treated and marked, costs nothing and moves the failure point to where it can be fixed with a forklift.
Act on the notice quickly and through the broker. The options and deadlines are set by the agriculture authority, and delay narrows them: re export windows run, storage charges accrue, and in cases of actual infestation the destruction of the packaging, under supervision, may be ordered. Arguing that the goods themselves are harmless misunderstands the refusal: the regulated article is the wood.
After any refusal, trace the packaging source in the supplier file and require corrective evidence before the next shipment: treatment certificates, mark photographs, a changed pallet supplier. A second refusal from the same origin reads as a shipper who does not control its packaging, and that reading follows the importer into future examination rates.
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No. Manufactured wood products such as plywood, particle board, and oriented strand board are exempt because their production removes the pest risk. Solid wood components used with them, including pallets and blocking, still need treatment and marking.
The mark shows the wheat sheaf symbol, the country code, the accredited producer code, and the treatment code, HT for heat treatment or MB for methyl bromide fumigation where still permitted. An illegible or incomplete mark is treated as no mark.
Options depend on the port and the finding, and may include treatment, separation, or re export under the authority directions, all at the importers cost and on its deadlines. Checking marks at origin is far cheaper than any destination remedy.
The standard regulates wood packaging material. A wooden product being imported as goods is classified and regulated as that product, though other rules can apply to wood products. Dunnage and packaging around it remain ISPM 15 territory.