CITES has no cure for elephant poaching
Compromise and Rhetoric is killing world’s elephants
Despite the praise for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora on its 40th anniversary, CITES has failed to protect the elephant. African elephant populations are under siege and in decline primarily to satiate the demand for ivory in Asia. In 2011 alone, around 25,000 elephants or more were slaughtered for their ivory and the killing was even worse in 2012.
Enough is enough. Several conservation and animal welfare organizations, including the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation (DSWF-United Kingdom), Elephant Advocacy League (United States), Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA-United Kingdom), Fondation Franz Weber (FFW-Switzerland), International Ranger Federation (Australia), Last Great Ape Organization (LAGA-Cameroon), Pro Wildlife (Germany), Robin des Bois (France), Youth for Conservation (Kenya) attending the 16th meeting of the CITES Conference of the Parties are outraged by the failure of CITES to stop the poaching of African elephants, particularly African elephants. Instead of demanding an end to the markets driving the slaughter, CITES Parties are coming up with weak compromises in a feeble attempt to stop the poaching. But China, the single country most responsible for the crisis due to its burgeoning ivory market, won’t even concede its responsibility as the main problem. Nor will CITES admit that previous decisions allowing “legal” sale of ivory to China and Japan have stimulated, not reduced, demand and directly contributed to the poaching.
Save the old ladies!
The decision to put to death two Asian elephants from the Golden Head Zoo (zoo de la Tête d’Or) in Lyon, France, would be tainted with illegality and cruelty.
Cruelty
Each year, thousands of elephants are put to death in Africa and Asia as a result of illegal ivory trade and the regression of their natural habitats. The execution of these two elephants, aged 42 and 43, can be added to that number. These elephants have reached a very respectable age for the elephantine species; only a small number of specimens in the wild have in this period the chance to grow as old.
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora about to be reborn as the WTO (World Trade Organization)
The 15th conference of the parties of CITES has just ended in Doha. The porbeagle shark was put back on the table following the intervention of Singapore, which believed that there had been technical problems with the first vote. The debates were evaded by a procedural trick and the proposal passed directly to vote. The proposal was rejected by three votes. Iceland, candidate to join the European Union, and Japan, which will host the Conference for Biodiversity next October, in showing the best intentions in the world, warmly hugged each other in the middle of the conference room to congratulate themselves on this failure of Europe and the protectors of sharks. Associations such as the Japan Fisheries Association quickly left to celebrate the result of intense lobbying. Installed to protect endangered species of wild fauna and flora from the excesses of international trade, CITES has progressively become a convention of the protection of trade. The delegate from Guinea summarized yesterday in plenary an analysis of a lot of the participants: “My comment is very bitter; I notice after having carefully listened to the debates that economic considerations dominate the environmental vision.” Decisions on marine species confirmed that the sea is considered by the international community as a reservoir for food, healing and decoration, but when it is time to protect it, it’s almost deserted, just like around Doha.
Rosewood tree, African elephant, polar bear and Mariana mallard
The 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties of CITES, Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora will take place in Doha, Qatar, from the 13th to 25th of March 2010. As with every precedent session since 1989, Robin des Bois will attend.
Currently at CITES there are 175 Parties. Decisions are based on a majority vote of 2/3. Appendix I bans international trade, Appendix II regulates trade and Appendix III is linked to an individual Party decision who asks other CITES Parties for assistance in controlling the trade. Robin des Bois’s summary of the previous CITES session is available on line at the following link (pdf in French).
Beijing 2008 : rings made of ivory
On 16th July, 2008 in Geneva, three weeks before the opening of the Olympic Games, China was given authorization to act as a commercial licensed partner within the legal elephant ivory traffic. Thus, the biggest black market for ivory in the world will consolidate its position. Thousands of ivory retailers throughout China can hold their heads up high as they cooly welcomed the tourists of olympic games. Within a couple of months according to the CITES program (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora), the price of 108 t of ivory stocks auctionned by South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe is expected to increase after China’s accreditation, Japan being till now the only legal candidate. As a matter of fact, little legal ivory is sufficient to launder a lot of illicit ivory and there is no doubt the price of ivory will skyrocket after China’s entry into ivory stock exchange.
