Hi!
I can't help with laws crossing borders. but keeping them safe and free of damage, or keeping a log, I could help/


First, for something of this distance you need very sturdy packing.
-double wall corrugate boxes- thicker and more durable. Here and in the USA there is a certificate printed on one of the bottom flaps. they say how much weight the box can hold safely, the crush rating and some how much lbs you can stack on top.

For actually packing up the collection
-acid free white tissue.
-fold top sandwhich bags.
-moisture absorbers (silica packets and the like)
I put them in bags, and wrapped with tissue. I well padded between layers (be careful of horns so they don't deform) and used a cut piece of corrugate to make the next platform. Not too many layers as ponies legs will start having pose issues.

One thing to be careful of is HEAT while in transit, before you get them to point B.




I've copied what I have written here before when someone else asked about long distance moving (which does have the risk of losing a box):




This is how I moved. (I am paranoid about my stuff)
1) I went around my home and took many, many pictures of things in my house as they are, room by room opening cabinets and getting photos of stuff inside. enough to prove what I owned and the general condition of my stuff.
2) packing I used a buddy/relative for important stuff. I would be packing up the box, and telling them each item as it went in which they were writing down for me with a pen and clipboard on their lap. and how I wanted it coded. Being good company, supplying your buddy with nice coffee and treats is an asset here.
3) I transferred all my data to computer and printed off my lists.
4) in addition to code our names were also on the boxes.


Everything I brought was in categories. I had TWO master lists. (I printed multiple copies too. one on me, one on another person, one in my overnight bag.
Kitchen was say K. and I had a colour mark I used on all those boxes. so say a yellow mark, and boxes would be K1, K2, K3 in black sharpie etc and all with a big yellow mark as well. I marked multiple sides of the box with the code so it's always easily seen.
First, it made things really easy. anything marked in yellow went straight to the kitchen. Blue to bedrooms, green to living room. etc.

So each "area" or category had their own code and colour.

The two master lists!:
My first brief list on top of the clipboard had the codes, area and listed the # of boxes. so if I sent 5 yellow K coded kitchen boxes and now only see 4, I KNOW which is missing straight away from checking my list- "oh no! K3 never made it"!

Like this:
Master list #1
Kitchen:
K1, K2, K3, K4, K5

Bedroom:
B1, B2, B3, B4

Pony Room:
M1, M2, M3, M4, M5, M6 (this one went on and on hehe)

This is the list I used on receipt day. Stacked the correct colours neatly in each room I would use a green highlighter to mark off all the ones I had. once the room was "there" I highlighted that off as well.
Kitchen:
K1, K2, K3, K4, K5

List two:
All the codes again, and by category. but this time each box had a list in detail of what was inside. (anything I cared about these were very detailed lists. so mostly collection ponies and my HIGHLY sentimental or valuable items) Stuff I didn't care so much about it was more brief M46 "assorted bait condition ponies" K5 "plastic containers and loose cooking utensils"

So if any box was missing, I knew immediately what WAS inside the box I didn't have.

Ponyroom:
M1: item, item, item, item, item, item, etc
M2: item, item, item, item, item, item, etc
M3: item, item, item, item, item, item, etc
M4: item, item, item, item, item, item, etc
M5: item, item, item, item, item, item, etc
M6: item, item, item, item, item, item, etc
It could be individual items or like "set of six first edition rainbow ponies" or "complete paradise estate playset"

Ponies were carefully packaged and kept COOL. (in fold top sandwich bags wrapped in white tissue. sides of boxes padded out so if the box got smacked in, my ponies would still be safe inside. I used sturdy corrugate boxes. You need to check the bottom panel and use ones with a good edge crush rating. I also well padded the tops SHOULD any have someone slice them open with a box cutter- none of the ponies would be cut too!

Also, on highly sentimental or important items (my collection and other belongings I would be heartbroken to lose)
there were a few papers included that stated the following in large font and would be IMMEDIATELY found upon opening the box.
Attention:
This is the property of (my name) and (Fiancee's name)
(Our phone numbers)
(Our new city/province)
If found please contact us at the numbers listed above, and xyz moving company at 555-555-5555

Since I'm setting up a pony room I figured it was time I sat down and figured out insurance for my collection. I've started typing up an inventory and already want to crawl under a rock and just not think about it.

Does anyone have any advice on how to evaluate my collection?
Should I be using approximate current values, or what I originally paid for items years ago?

I know it's going to be different to insure them in Aus than the US, but any advice at all would be greatly appreciated. 

You'll need to talk to an agent to figure out what policies are available and what each requires.

It's good to have a detailed inventory regardless
I keep- in order of year, then set:
what I bought,
when,
from who/where
how much
details about condition (how I cleaned, ANY flaws and blemishes, any restorations etc).
special notes: peachy with darker symbol or special colour eye paint. if something is slightly different.

I find my logs a bit fun to look back on too.


Here I can't find a company that will allow me to come up with my own list (and documentation/reciepts). I would need to hire a professional appraiser and pay for their report first.

Why do all Perfume Puffs inevitably fade?

the dye.

All colours will fade eventually.
most sensitive hair- fading pink, dyed hair ponies -horizontal stripes & purfume puff.

That lavender colour on blossom, and cotton candy's pink shaded hair gets dingy or chalky looking more easily then other hair colours.

paint pigments- lavenders, pinks seem the most sensitive (on lavender/mauve shades, reds fade away leaving a more periwinkle shade behind).

Purple/lavender is often one of the most sensitive body colours.

extended UV though will damage everything. Once stabilizers are consumed, they'll start discoloring or weeping. In some ways it's nice to have pieces that are so sensitive and delicate that they act like the canary in the coal mine and indicate either light, heat or moisture is an issue.


"Although PVC is susceptible to degradation by light and heat, this is not usually the most serious problem in museums. Exposure of PVC to light (especially ultraviolet radiation) and heat will cause a degradation reaction, called dehydrochlorination, which produces hydrochloric acid and causes the PVC to change color from yellow to brown to black. Manufacturers control this by adding light and heat stabilizers. Unfortunately these stabilizers are consumed as they do their job, until at some time the stabilizers are exhausted, and additional exposure suddenly results in deterioration. Thus a PVC object that has been surviving nicely under lights for several years may suddenly begin rapid deterioration. This was a common scenario for the vinyl roofs on cars. They would be in good shape for several years then suddenly rot away. In experiments on PVC degradation Shashoua (Shashoua 1996, Shashoua and Ward 1995) did not detect dehydrochlorination at room temperature in the dark after 6 months. However in accelerated aging experiments dehydrochlorination did occur but incorporation of zeolites or epoxidized soya bean oil (ESBO) inhibited the discoloration of PVC caused by dehydrochlorination. Shashoua suggests including zeolite pellets in storage boxes containing PVC objects to inhibit discoloration. "
http://cool.conservation-us.org/waac/wn/wn24/wn24-1/wn24-102.html

She's one of my all time favorites, easily. If I find a nice one, you know, good body, great curls etc. she gets added to the hoard. I feel a little guilty having so many, but she's a common enough pony for that.

I have issues with most early ponies. But typically it's different issues, or discernible differences vs. the blatant surprise hoarding I have going on.

Finding them, ebay. easily. but:

1- NO BUYING GSP listings with fragile stuff! (global shipping program). They repackage and have removed padding (according to one of my sellers who was mortified as to how I received my order, the second just apologized for GSP's repacking). I only bought two GSP packages, both pitney bowes repacked shoddily and stuffed into the tiniest boxes they could manage. thankfully these were loose more sturdy ponies, and they regained their proper shape after a while.

2- if the seller isn't an experienced pony person, be sure to verify before bidding that they are packed in a sturdy box and pad well for shipping.

current pricing, no idea on that. I haven't been buying MOC's for a while. I just bid what I feel good with paying anyway.

(another edit, missed the original question)
OP
Peachy is the trickiest FF to find. Even so, she does turn up with some regularity hidden in US lots.
If she shows up solo and it's a case of OMG must have this NOW! bidding can get a bit crazy if another person has the same thoughts.


She is prone to those teeny little fungus stains (darker dot surrounded by a ring). a simple clean and she is fine - the spots are not active/spreading. you won't see more unless you have poor storage (heat, moisture, UV)


Patient looking for one anywhere from $10 - $25 depending on what flaws you are happy to live with, and how many are after her at the moment.

Some theories are that she came with the My Pretty Pony (the one that looks like her) as there was a set like this, but nobody's managed to prove it I don't think.

I would call her a US pony. Because everything in the US was a little earlier than in other places, it's more likely that she would be there than here. Mine came from the US, and I've never found one here in the last couple of decades. But if she was sold with that Pretty Pony set, then that would also make her US, and maybe Canada? As that set wasn't sold in other places as far as I know...

Admittedly have no idea what happened with the release in Australia, NZ, Singapore or that part of the world. There's just no documentation on it :/

I really love the pretty ponies.

Pretty Pony
brown pretty pony (basic) a couple versions, pony pretty much the same, have seen slight differences in regards to hair texture. Differences to box and slight accessory differences

Pink pretty pony -other than some coming with an undisclosed ribbon, haven't seen differences in this set. Old lore was she came in different colours i.e "yellow pretty pony", but it's lore. Some discolour so evenly, and nicely leaving intact bright paint she looks like an entirely different pony. (heat alone in a dark place can discolour leaving her paint still bright and true. Also, I assume some batches were crummy plastic. didn't contain the right amounts of stabilizers so her colour didn't stay true)

Pretty Pony and baby set-
"baby" in any intact one I have seen was an early CF. Pony slightly different then solo brown pretty pony. Some accessory differences between this set and the original.
I still would love this set. Most that have come up that I would have loved to throw a bid on were US only.

"collector ponies"
original name for set: my little pony
--------
FF issues My Little Pony set + Pretty Parlor(7 total): original 6, peachy.

CF issues My Little Pony set +++ (many.): The first issue of CF hoof ponies was on the original "my little pony" cards, like the FF's. PP also is most common in CF, and now we have the stable too.
------------


FF's came with heavier washers and two of them to act as a counterbalance. Even with this, they are somewhat tippy and prone to face planting.  Being a toy for such young kids, with poorer fine motor skills to leave them standing, and I imagine the costs of additional materials to weight them, I assume they were recast pretty quickly to the early CF mold.



Also, many of the early ponies (with the same set names) could be purchased through some select department store catalogues, and did not come carded but boxed, sealed in a bag inside. Unfortunately I do not have a full list of every pony that could have been sold this way.

 

It makes the most sense, except the earliest prototype image I've seen of the Grooming/Pretty Parlour doesn't show Peachy. It actually shows Butterscotch.

But all these things still reinforce the idea that she is a US pony. Because things happened there first, it makes the most sense. It does seem the Parlour was the first playset (it certainly seems to have been here).

I would love to see this- US image? I feel like half of my collection is information. I love collecting scans and images of old dealer catalogues and store ones for pony things.

All the things you mention are my main reason for steering clear of price guides. People do ask me by email a lot when they find stuff in their attic but I tell them to come to a place like this to ask because it fluctuates. And yeah, a particular craze for a particular item at one point can affect the market. :/

Equally sellers who have great reputations for accuracy get better sale returns than those who dump dirty messy ponies on with one line descriptions, even if it's the same pony.

Exactly this.
 and, for bolded- and I wrote about this exact thing as a mini rant in a collecting group last night of junk sellers using such examples to price.

Some pony sellers are in such a special class, their prices are irrelevant to use or include in a current price-point. It's not the item that made the end price- it's the reputation that took years to cultivate  (knowledge to a rare degree, kindness, exceedingly exceptional service, accuracy, and integrity) of the seller that created it. Most of that reputation is passed along quietly between collectors too.


second part of my rant references these special sellers.

I've seen some funny stuff on ebay for sure that skews up prices (making them in actuality not real, and not reflect what actual collectors pay when buying and selling amongst themselves) Some ways of doing this are fairly well known, others less known. I won't say how here as it could attract copycats, and people who collect and want to buy things continuing being able to do so is my concern.

Also, in my category at least some sellers have unique end prices to THEM, it's less about the item and more who it is coming from. Those sellers worked and made very good connections for years to get that kind of reputation of service and trustworthiness and it definitely reflects in how high their items hit. Other collectors, or toy dealers can't match. One local dealer I dealt with a couple times when things did get discounted always referenced one particular seller's prices as a base for their items. The sellers who's listings were used as a pricing table was one who was in this rare and extra special seller category.