Date: Sat, 3 Dec 1994 22:20:05 -0800 (PST) From: Alexander Volokh Subject: CEI LIST - PROTECTING ENDANGERED SPECIES HALF TO DEATH To: Recipients of the CEI List PROTECTING ENDANGERED SPECIES HALF TO DEATH by Ike C. Sugg, CEI fellow in wildlife and land-use policy, and contributor to the book "Elephants and Whales: Resources for Whom?" to be published in December by Gordon & Breach. appeared in *The Washington Times*, 11/9/94 There were approximately 50,000 black rhinos roaming wild on the African continent when the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) banned the rhino horn trade in the mid-1970s. Today barely 2,000 black rhinos remain in all of Africa. Banning the international trade in rhino products -- which are highly valued in the Far East for use in folk medicines -- was supposed to "save" the black rhino. Yet now it appears that this near-sighted pachyderm may be "protected" into extinction by a short-sighted ban. To many, of course, the black rhino's demise demonstrates that commercialization will be the doom of wildlife. More perceptive observers view it as evidence that the protectionist paradigms of CITES can do wildlife more harm than good. Between these two perspectives lies a vast philosophical, and often cultural, chasm. There is a chance to bridge this divide this week in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., where CITES is having its Ninth Conference of the Parties. Hundreds of people representing non-governmental organizations will come together, as they do every two years at CITES, to debate new regulatory proposals. But the rural people of developing countries and the wildlife they live alongside are effectively without voice, and they are the ones who stand to lose the most ground at CITES. Proposals to reclassify over 100 different species of plants and animals from all over the world will be debated. In a broader sense, the character of the relationship between Man and Nature will be on the table, as will the future of CITES itself. CITES is meeting in the United States for the first time since 1973, when 21 nations signed the treaty in Washington. Since then, CITES has garnered 124 member nations and listed thousands of species on its four appendices. Appendix I is the highest level of "protection" afforded by CITES -- roughly equivalent to an "endangered" listing under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. According to the Convention, Appendix I "shall include all species threatened with extinction that are or may be affected by trade." In all but a few exceptional circumstances, Parties to CITES are prohibited from trade in Appendix I species beyond their national borders. One problem with CITES is that dozens if not hundreds of species have been listed on Appendix I that were not and are not "threatened with extinction." Most prominent among them is the African elephant, which did not satisfy the listing criteria in 1989 when it was put on Appendix I. There are over 600,000 elephants across Africa today. Similarly, the Minke whale was placed on Appendix I in 1986, even though experts widely recognized at the time that the whale did not warrant listing. Today there are over 100,000 Minke whales in the North Atlantic alone. Ironically, neither was the black rhino endangered when it was listed in 1975. But after spending nearly 10 years on Appendix I, the black rhino now stands precariously close to extinction. That non-endangered species have been listed under CITES as if they were endangered should not come as a surprise to those who have witnessed the corruption of science under U.S. environmental laws. Creatures of politics are apt to be captured by the special interests that created them. The new twist to CITES is that an increasing number of conservationists are becoming aware that something is wrong with the notion that commerce should be criminalized if a species is "or may be affected by trade." Some conservationists, like Rowan Martin of Zimbabwe's Department of National Parks and Wild Life Management, believe that commerce in species that have floundered under strict government regulation should not only be allowed, but encouraged. The rationale for such unconventional approaches to conserving wildlife is straightforward. If something does not work, try something else. Trade bans attempt to destroy the legal economic value of wildlife, which is precisely why they have failed. Ninety-five percent of the world's terrestrial wildlife habitat lies outside of national parks and other government-owned "protected areas." In developing countries, almost 40 percent of that habitat has been converted into agriculture since 1960. One of the major reasons such extensive habitat destruction has occurred in the Third World is that cows and plows pay, whereas wildlife does not. Commerce in and the private ownership of wildlife is illegal in most developing countries, as it is in the U.S. If local people cannot legally benefit from the existence of wildlife, they have no choice but to put their land to other uses. In developing countries, people faced with a law imposed from a far-away city take little time in choosing between observing the law and feeding their families -- if they are aware of the law at all. Thus without value, wildlife loses ground. The shame of it is that wildlife is potentially much more valuable than either cereal crops or beef cattle in many of these areas. That is why Zimbabwe has sought to "privatize" its wildlife. Since beginning this process in 1975, the amount of land dedicated to wildlife has increased from approximately 17,000 square kilometers to 30,000. The number of elephants, cheetahs, leopards, ostriches and crocodiles has increased as a result. The Nile crocodile, for one, would not have recovered without the positive economic incentives created by legal trade, according to Dr. Jon Hutton, a member of the World Conservation Union's Crocodile Specialist Group. Moreover, he says, had Zimbabwe not filed a formal "reservation" with CITES against the Appendix I listing of the Nile crocodile, legal trade would never have occurred -- and thus the animal would not likely have increased in Zimbabwe from only a few thousand to as many as 100,000 today. Even such examples of truly "sustainable development" are opposed by the preservationists who have hijacked CITES in recent years. But they, too, stand to lose ground in CITES this year. Philosophically, the ensuing battle is an ideological conflict between two warring paradigms, between conservation and preservation. The difference is that the preservationists want to "save" wildlife from use, whereas conservationists want to save wildlife for use. Thus, ultimately, the CITES showdown is between those who care about future generations of people, and those who do not. _______ __________ ___________ / | / | | | |__________ | | | | \ | | \ _______ |__________ ___________ COMPETITIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE 1001 Connecticut Ave. NW #1250 Washington, DC 20036 202-331-1010, fax 202-331-0640 cei@digex.com Permission to copy granted as long as these lines are left intact. To subscribe to the cei list, or to get the "1995 Federal Disaster Calendar," send a message to volokh@netcom.com. "The Virtual Hand: CEI's free-market guide to the information superhighway" is available for $5. CEI's monthly newsletter, "CEI UpDate," is free to contributors of $25.