Morocco

Morocco's trilobites, Devonian goniatites and orthoceras plates, Cretaceous phosphate shark and mosasaur teeth, Kem Kem material and Eocene Ouled Abdoun fossils reach every show in the world through a trade that is legal and regulated. Law 33-13 (the 2015 Mining Code), Article 116, subjects the extraction, collection and sale of fossils, meteorites and mineral specimens to permits; Decree 1308-94 and a 2019 application decree set the export procedure, with export certificates issued by the Ministry of Energy and Mines. A Moroccan lot should have an invoice from a licensed dealer and, on import to the US or EU, a customs entry describing it as fossils.

The practical position for common material — trilobites, ammonites, orthoceras, shark teeth, mosasaur teeth — is that licensed wholesalers export in quantity with certificates and customs paperwork, and the trade is lawful. Keep the invoice and the customs documents for every lot; in the US the Lacey Act does not reach fossils, but customs declarations are still legal documents.

Dinosaur and significant vertebrate material is different: since about 2020 fossils have been treated as geological heritage requiring ministry licences, and wholesalers report that Spinosaurus, Kem Kem dinosaur bone and articulated marine reptiles are effectively unexportable even with a licence. Assume any such material offered without a numbered Moroccan export certificate left illegally, and that a museum will not accept it and a court might return it.

Restoration is the other disclosure: 20–25 % restoration is standard on Moroccan trilobites and mosasaur jaws, composites (“trilobite pizzas”, jaws with replaced teeth) are common, and the buyer's protection is the seller's written description. The record should say Morocco, the region (Alnif, Erfoud, Khouribga, Taouz), the dealer and the restoration.

Verify locally: the current decree number and the certificate format change; Moroccan customs brokers and the larger US importers know the paperwork of the season.