Notification to the Parties

CONCERNING:

National Legislation Project

CITES Legislation Plan

1. At its 46th meeting (Geneva, March 2002), the Standing Committee agreed that 73 Parties should provide an outline of their programme to comply with their obligation to adopt adequate legislation to implement the Convention, in the form of a CITES Legislation Plan. The purpose of this plan is to establish and commit to a timeframe for the adoption of national legislation pursuant to Resolution Conf. 8.4 and Decisions 11.18 and 11.19.

2. CITES Legislation Plans are required from all 73 Parties and should be submitted to the Secretariat by 31 May 2002. They should take into account the deadlines for the enactment of the national legislation as follows.

a) For Parties in Category 3, concerned by Decision 11.18, namely the Dominican Republic and Mozambique, the CITES Legislation Plan should include the agreed steps needed to adopt adequate legislation by 31 October 2002.

The Secretariat shall issue a Notification recommending a suspension of commercial trade in specimens of CITES-listed species with any of these Parties that fails to submit a CITES Legislation Plan by 31 May 2002 or to adopt adequate legislation by 31 October 2002. The Secretariat may withhold action on this instruction if good legislative progress has been made by a Party but shall implement the instruction immediately if adequate legislation has not been adopted by 31 March 2003.

b) For Parties in Category 2, concerned by Decision 11.18, namely Cameroon, Panama, Poland, the Russian Federation, South Africa and Thailand, the CITES Legislation Plan should include the agreed steps needed for each Party to adopt adequate legislation by 31 January 2003.

The Secretariat shall issue a Notification recommending a suspension of commercial trade in specimens of CITES-listed species with any of these Parties that fails to submit a CITES Legislation Plan by 31 May 2002 or to adopt adequate legislation by 31 January 2003. The Secretariat may withhold action on this instruction if good legislative progress has been made by a Party but shall implement the instruction immediately if adequate legislation has not been adopted by 31 March 2003.

c) For Parties in Categories 2 and 3, concerned by Decision 11.19, namely Algeria, the Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Botswana, Brunei-Darussalam, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, China, Comoros, Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Cyprus, Djibouti, Ecuador, Equatorial Guinea, El Salvador, Eritrea, Estonia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Greece, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Honduras, Hungary, India, Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritius, Monaco, Morocco, Namibia, Nepal, Niger, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tunisia, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, the United Republic of Tanzania, Uruguay, Venezuela and Zambia, the CITES Legislation Plan should include the agreed steps needed for each Party to adopt adequate legislation by 31 December 2003.

The Standing Committee shall consider further action at its 47th meeting. The Standing Committee expects the affected Parties to meet the above deadlines so that further measures, which could include restrictions on commercial trade, will not be required. If an affected Party fails to adopt adequate legislation by 31 December 2003, the Standing Committee shall recommend restrictions on commercial trade at its first meeting after that date, unless this Party can show good cause for its lack of adequate progress.

3. The CITES Legislation Plan to be submitted should specify the entire legislative process from the date the proposed legislation is drafted until the date it is signed, published in the official gazette and sent to the Secretariat in one of the working languages of the Convention. It should include:

a) The legal form of enactment (legislative or regulatory);

b) The precise scope and content of the proposed legislation;

c) The schedule for transmittal of the draft legislation to the Secretariat for comments;

d) The legislative and administrative steps that must be taken to adopt the legislation; and

e) The period of time in which the Party can achieve the proposed form of enactment in accordance with its own legal system (timeframes for initiating and completing each stage of the law-making process).

4. Parties that are preparing national legislation to fulfil the requirements established by the text of the Convention may request technical assistance from the Secretariat.

5. Since the Parties concerned should enact or amend domestic legislation to comply with their international obligations under the Convention within the deadline established by the Standing Committee, they are expected to use all the flexibility available within their normal legislative procedures to enact the required legislation as speedily as possible.