SADC moves to start legal wildlife trade outside CITES

The states dismissed the CITES voting process and reinforced their position that the UN agency’s trading rules are “tainted, rigged and not free and fair.”

After the 18th CITES conference voted to block the SADC countries from trading in specific animals in August, some of them recently officially filed reservations with CITES to ignore the vote, a dramatic action the CITES treaty permits. The SADC states have declared that they would not abide by the CITES restrictions that are detrimental to conservation and development in their countries.