Meat Products

Can I take Meat Products across a border? Yes in many places, with conditions. Of the 167 country-rules we've indexed for Meat Products, 2 are allowed (often with limits), 157 are restricted (permit, declaration, or quantity cap), and 8 are prohibited outright. Customs rules depend on the destination, the purpose (travelling, posting, importing personally, or importing commercially), and the quantity.

Meat products encompass fresh, frozen, cured, dried, and processed meats including beef, pork, chicken, lamb, and game. International customs authorities treat meat with high scrutiny due to the risk of transmitting animal diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease, African swine fever, and avian influenza. The stakes for agricultural authorities are enormous — a single infected piece of meat introduced into a disease-free country can trigger an outbreak that costs billions of dollars and requires mass culling of livestock. This is why countries like Australia, New Zealand, and the United States maintain some of the world's strictest biosecurity rules regarding meat. The risk is not only from fresh meat but from any product containing meat-derived ingredients, including jerky, cured sausages, salami, prosciutto, vacuum-sealed deli meats, and cooked ready-to-eat products. Even commercially produced, vacuum-sealed, shelf-stable products are subject to confiscation at biosecurity borders if they originate from countries with different animal disease status. Australia's Border Force regularly confiscates salami and prosciutto from European travelers who assume that vacuum-sealing or cooking renders a product safe for import. The EU has a tiered system that permits meat imports from countries that have been assessed as meeting EU food safety and animal health standards, but this approval process is lengthy and most countries outside the EU and a handful of others do not qualify. Homemade and market-purchased meat products face the greatest risk at any border worldwide.

Common mistakes with Meat Products

• Assuming the rules at the origin apply at the destination — they don't. The destination customs authority is the binding rule.
• Travelling and posting are treated differently: an item you can carry may be prohibited by post (and vice versa).
• Personal vs commercial intent: above a quantity threshold, customs may treat your shipment as commercial regardless of intent.
• Undervaluing on the customs declaration to avoid duty — treated as fraud in most jurisdictions.
• Vague item descriptions on CN22/CN23 — biggest single cause of postal customs holds.
• Bringing meat or dairy from outside an approved zone — usually blocked on biosecurity grounds regardless of quantity.
• Missing required certificates (phytosanitary, veterinary, CITES, prescription, product compliance).

Always verify against the destination's customs authority before acting. Not legal advice.

HS codes

• 0201 — Meat of bovine animals, fresh or chilled
• 0203 — Meat of swine, fresh, chilled or frozen
• 1602 — Other prepared or preserved meat, meat offal or blood

Regulatory trend

https://ec.europa.eu/food/animals/animal-health/legislation/animal-health-law_en — EU Animal Health Law 2021 expanded controls

Names in other languages

es

productos cárnicos, carne, embutidos

fr

produits carnés, viande, charcuterie

de

Fleischerzeugnisse, Fleisch, Wurstwaren

zh

肉制品, 肉类, 加工肉

ja

肉製品, 食肉加工品, 肉類

General notes