Congratulations on your planned venture to export handicraft to the USA. -

To answer your question briefly, you may click on this link to The Department of Trade and Industry. They give more precise procedures and detailed information and of course, with authority. http://www.dti.gov.ph/dti/index.php?p=223

It is better to follow their instructions and suggestions, however, on the shipping process, I suggest that you contact an Export Broker. To do the shipping yourself requires a lot of work for you in the documentation and inspection process. If you hire a brokerage firm, you only prepare your PACKING LIST (s) and the broker takes over. Then hands all documents to you when the container is loaded and shipped. Then you can present these documents to your bank and collect the proceeds of the Letter of Credit. If the merchandise are PREPAID, then you can mail the Invoices and required documents to your buyer (s)

By the way, this answer is on the presumption that you are already organized and ready to go.

Otherwise, I suggest that you make more research, specially on the category of the craft that you wish to get involved with. Then make a market study and see how it could produce a good profit for you because handicrafts in my experience is a very low margin business. The cost from the manufacturer to final loading of the goods sometimes become very high and the buyers also demand that they pay only so much. Make a thorough research before you do anything else. Visit the the DTI website as well as get information from CITEM. They will help you succeed.

I have a few articles about International Trading which might be of help. You can read them here:

http://www.powerhomebiz.com/vol21/trading.htm 

http://www.powerhomebiz.com/vol8/exporting.htm 

http://www.powerhomebiz.com/vol11/trading.htm 

In the meantime, start with the Bureau of Census and Statistics.

Let me know the outcome.

Nach M Maravilla

About the PowerHomeBiz.com Guide: 

Nach Maravilla is the Publisher of Power Homebiz Guides. He has over thirty years experience in sales and marketing of various products, which covered as he jokingly describes, "from toothpicks to airplanes"  He also had extensive experience in International trading and he always excelled in special promotional ideas for  retail outlets. 

The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author, not of PowerHomeBiz.com. Users should not treat the Guide's response as legal, accounting, or professional advice as all answers are intended to be general in nature. Such advice can only be properly given by qualified professionals who are fully aware of a user's specific geographical areas or circumstances, such as an attorney or accountant.