EU Wildlife Protection Legal Instruments (Mapping the EU Legislation)
Wildlife Trade Regulations: Cites Framework
Cites Framework
The EU is one of 185 parties to CITES. Its regulation of wildlife trade interacts with the global CITES regime and implements the international requirements with additional, EU-specific rules (see below).
CITES works by subjecting international trade in specimens of selected species to certain controls. All import, export, re-export and introduction from the sea of species covered by the Convention has to be authorised through a licensing system. Each party to the Convention must designate one or more Management Authorities in charge of administering that licensing system and one or more Scientific Authorities to advise them on the effects of trade on the status of the species.
The animal and plant species subject to different degrees of regulation are listed in one of three Appendices of the Convention according to the degree of protection they need. Overall, the CITES Convention protects about 5 800 species of animals and 300 000 species of plants.
The monitoring of trade is an essential tool for achieving the aims of the Convention. Scientific Authorities monitor export permits granted for Appendix II species (see below) and the actual export thereof. They advise their Management Authorities on when to limit the issue of export permits whenever they determine that exports should be limited in order to maintain a species throughout its range at a level consistent with its role in the ecosystems in which it occurs and well above the level at which it might become eligible for inclusion in Appendix I.
A second important monitoring system is based on the trade records kept by all parties and reported to the Secretariat on an annual basis. In their annual reports, parties are required to submit data on all trade in specimens of species covered by CITES. Trade data from all parties together provides statistical information on the total volume of world trade in CITES species, which is available here. These annual reports further reflect the performance of parties regarding CITES implementation when all reported exports and re-exports are compared with all reported imports.