LMI Help Center

Environmental Responsibility and the Lacey Act

Many customers today are concerned about compliance with the Lacey Act. One of the easiest and best ways to ensure compliance on your part is to purchase woods only through reputable suppliers like LMI.  We work hard to determine that the imported woods you purchase from us were harvested and imported legally and ethically. As a leader in the instrument grade woods business, LMI has a long history of supporting sustainable logging practices. We have always identified our woods by scientific name. In the 90’s we abandoned the sale of Brazilian Rosewood when the legitimacy of the wood became iffy at best, in 2005 we voluntarily stopped purchasing Pernambuco and in 2009 we discontinued Camatillo. All of these prohibitions were self-enacted by LMI, despite the profitability of these woods.

The ascendance of the global economy has constantly pushed the environmental community to keep up with economic pressures and, as a result, LMI  participated in a Lacey Act convention held to help guide and explain the implementation of the Act in its most recent form. Our current wood handling procedures conform with the Act and we have enacted a program that ensures that all our wood vendors are in compliance with the laws of the United States and countries within which the woods are harvested.

The Lacey Act, passed originally in 1900 and amended many times, makes it unlawful to import, export, transport, sell, receive, acquire, or purchase in interstate or foreign commerce any plant taken in violation of any US or foreign law that protects plants. The Act requires an import declaration that must contain the scientific name of the plant, value of the importation, quantity of the plant, and name of the country from which the plant was harvested. Submitting false identification or declaration, no matter whether purposefully or not, is also a violation of the Lacey Act.