Procedure Japan Post ship by sea/surface

Can anyone help with the correct procedure, labels, documentation, and so on for sending personal items to Europe by 'surface/sea' with Japan Post?

Is it sufficient for me just to make a full list of items plus value and put this inside the box (or stick to outside of box), plus address label?

Finally, will Japan Post do pick up from my house, or must I take it to the post office. I anticipate sending around 10 boxes of 15-30kg over a period of months.

http://www.post.japanpost.jp/int/index_en.html

We regularly use this service as it is cheap and we don't really care if it takes 2 or 3 months to arrive. Earlier this year we noticed that the Japanese Post Office has been getting more strict on the regulations and we needed to fill in a Post Office form giving an itemized list grouped by type of item (for example: 5 books, 5 sacks of koji, etc.) of the content and the values in English and prices in yen.

It is probably best to pick that up these forms or you'll find yourself copying your list onto their form at the post office.
We have always dropped our boxes off at the Post Office.

Thanks for great advice above!

Just one thing. It looks like customs forms need to be quite detailed, but does this mean that if I have 1 x box with 30 books or 250 CDs I have to list them all plus individual value for each?? Goodness, I hope not. But then is it acceptable to just list 250 CDs, value (total) 10,000 yen, or 30 books, value (total) 50,000 yen?

Yes, for us that was fine, we could suffice with writing down 10 books, 5 CDs, etc.and the totals prices for these books and the CDs etc.
Note that you might be charged import duty when receiving the box at the destination, but that is a different story, of course :-)

Hoshisato

These are personal effects. I'm moving to the country. So no tax.

They may be personal effects. But that is not how most tax offices/customs departments see it.

You can write "personal items" and add a value of "zero" in the description and value columns. But they can just add their own market value to the items.

You need to research the destination country on the import processes to clarify is and duties are payable.

Also keep in mind that they offer a 10% discount on shipments of 10 or more boxes, so it may be worth sending them all at once if possible.