CITES - A Suitable Tool For Sustainable Wildlife Trade?

15h30 - 17h00

Due to progressing globalisation, international wildlife trade has been amounting to volumes estimated to be worth billions of US$ annually, involving more than 350 million wild plants and wild animals every year. Notably, products derived from, inter alia, various animals, timber and fish species are heavily traded on international markets, slowly shifting the latter's characteristics of traded species towards those of globally traded commodities. Since 1973, trade in wildlife species has largely been regulated through the Convention on Trade in Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna (CITES). Over the past few decades, there has been an increasing recognition that economic and social incentives could make an important contribution to achieving the goals of the Convention. These could include the possibility of expanding the use of economic instruments (e.g. export quotas, labelling systems for caviar, property rights) in addition to the traditional command and control regulations, as well as to increasingly take into account sustainable livelihood considerations, in particular with regard to traded species with high economic value. In another debate, an area of potential tension between WTO and CITES has been identified which relates to certain 'stricter domestic measures' allowed under the Convention, as the application of such measures based on rather unilateral than multilateral criteria could be seen by WTO members as discriminatory or a disguised restriction on international trade.

The meeting aims to stimulate debate among policy makers and other influencers of the policy making process with respect to the interlinkages between trade, wildlife protection and sustainable development, especially with a view to fisheries, timber and ivory trade.

Questions to be addressed could include:

• How do CITES measures take into account considerations related to sustainable livelihoods and poverty alleviation?
• How does/should CITES integrate the internationally recognised principle of 'common but differentiated responsibilities'?
• Which market-based implementation tools does CITES have at hand? How could the toolbox be expanded?
• Is CITES the appropriate framework for the increasing trade in species with high economic value?
• Could the application of 'stricter domestic measures' lead to WTO non-conformity of certain measures under CITES? How could any possible conflicts be addressed?
• How could the objective of wildlife conservation and the principle of 'sustainable use' be balanced?

Chair: Rob MONRO, Africa Resources Trust

Guest speakers:

Cecile MACHENA, Africa Resources Trust.
David NEWTON, TRAFFIC East/Southern Africa - South Africa
Jorge VIGANO, WTO Trade and Environment Division
Willem WIJNSTEKERS, CITES Secretary-General