IWMC.org - 2nd Symposium - Aquatic Resources

CITES, IUCN and the Precautionary Principle, as they Relate to Classifying Marine Species as "Endangered" Prof. Douglas Stuart Butterworth (biography) MARAM (Marine Resource Assessment and Management Group) Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, South Africa

Post Script

The working paper regarding the CITES criteria developed by the FAO Secretariat and three consultants, whose preparation was mentioned above, includes an interesting suggestion to address the problems arising from the "decline" criterion. This is that this criterion should apply only if there are insufficient data to judge whether a species should be listed under the other CITES Appendix I criteria, viz. small size in absolute terms or restricted area of distribution. This working paper goes on to add that in circumstances where the decline criterion is overridden in this manner, guidelines on absolute numbers and area should be interpreted generously, for greater confidence that a decision not to list a species in such circumstances is correct. Ť

References

Butterworth, D. S. 1999. Possible interpretation problems for the current CITES listing criteria in the context of marine fish species under commercial harvest. Population Ecology (in press).

Butterworth, D. S., Punt, A. E. and Smith, A. D. M. 1996. On plausible hypotheses and their weighting, with implications for selection between variants of the Revised Management Procedure. Rep. int. Whal. Commn 46: 637-640.

FAO. 1996. Precautionary approach to capture fisheries and species introductions. Elaborated by the Technical Consultation on the Precautionary Approach to Capture Fisheries (Including Species Introductions). Lysekil, Sweden, 6-13 June 1995. FAO Technical Guidelines for Responsible Fisheries. No. 2. Rome, FAO. 54pp.

IUCN. 1994. IUCN Red List Categories, prepared by the IUCN Species Survival Commission. IUCN, Gland, Switzerland. 21pp.

IUCN. 1999. IUCN Red List Criteria Review Provisional Report. Draft of the Proposed Changes and Recommendations. Web site http://www.iucn.org/themes/ssc/provisional.htm. 21pp. IWC. 1997. Report of the Scientific Committee, Annex G. Report of the Sub-Committee on North Pacific Bryde's Whales. Rep. int. Whal. Commn 47: 163-168.

Roberts, C. M. and Hawkins, J. P. 1998. Extinction risk in the sea. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 14( 6): 241-246.

TRAFFIC. 1997. Recommendations on Proposals to Amend the CITES Appendices at the tenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties, Harare, Zimbabwe, June 1997. TRAFFIC International, Cambridge, UK. 36pp.

IWMC World Conservation Trust