BEYOND ENFORCEMENT:
Communities, governance, incentives and sustainable use in combating wildlife crime
26 – 28 February 2015
Glenburn Lodge, Muldersdrift, South Africa
Opening Speech by John E. Scanlon, Secretary-General CITES
Delivered by Tom De Meulenaer, Chief, CITES Scientific Support
Ms. Edna Molewa, Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs of South Africa,
Mr Braulio de Souza Dias, Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity,
Representatives of the IUCN Sustainable Use and Livelihood Specialist Group and of the International Institute for Environment and Development,
Distinguished guests, friends and colleagues.
Secretary-General's statements
Opening remarks at the
Workshop on demand-side strategies for curbing illegal ivory trade
CITES Secretary-General, Mr John E. Scanlon
Hangzhou, China
28-29 January 2015
Mr Mr Liu Dongsheng, Vice Administrator, State Forestry Administration
Mr Lin Yunju, Director General of the Forestry Department of Zhejiang Province
Dr Meng Xianlin, Director-General, CITES Management Authority of China
Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen.
CITES Secretary-General's statement at CoP11 of the Convention on Migratory Species - Quito, Ecuador
CITES and the CMS share common origins, have complementary mandates, and enjoy longstanding and deepening programmatic collaboration.
It was IUCN that first called for these two conventions in the early 1960’s. This call was heeded and enshrined in recommendations adopted at the UN Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment in 1972, which led to CITES and the CMS being adopted within the decade – CITES in 1973 and the CMS in 1979.
Over the past 24 months we have seen a number of countries, including Belgium, Chad, China, Hong Kong SAR, China, Czech Republic, Gabon, France, Philippines, and the USA, destroy stockpiles of illegally traded elephant ivory and rhino horn that have been seized and confiscated.
CBD CoP12 side event
Does biodiversity matter for development? EU's Development Cooperation
launches its B4Life Flagship Initiative
Opening Statement
John E Scanlon, Secretary General, CITES
(Delivered by Milena Sosa Schmidt)
ITTO-CITES: Working together to sustain tropical tree species
Opening Statement
John E Scanlon, Secretary General, CITES
Side event at 12th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity
Pyeongchang, Republic of Korea, 15 October 2014
Chair, Emmanuel Ze Meka, Executive Director, ITTO, Astrid Schomaker, Head of the Unit for Global Sustainability, Trade and Multilateral Agreements, Director General of the Environment European Commission, friends and colleagues.
Alors que nous sommes bientôt à mi-parcours de l’échéance de 2020 pour atteindre l’ensemble commun de nos objectifs et stratégies pour la biodiversité, il est opportun de réfléchir sur la façon dont la Convention sur le commerce international des espèces de faune et de flore sauvages menacées d'extinction (CITES) contribue à réaliser le Plan stratégique pour la diversité biologique (2011-2020) ; à atteindre les 20 Objectifs d’Aichi pour la biodiversité ; et à célébrer la vision de la Décennie des Nations Unies pour la biodiversité d’un monde vivant en harmonie avec la nature [1].
As we approach the mid-way point to the 2020 deadline to achieve our common set of biodiversity targets and strategies, it is an opportune moment to reflect on how the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) is contributing to: realizing the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity (2011-2020); achieving the 20 Aichi Biodiversity Targets; and celebrating the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity's vision of a world living in harmony with nature.
High-level Discussion: "Poaching and Illicit Wildlife Trafficking
– Towards Joint Action by the International Community "
A joint event of the Gabonese Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany
United Nations Headquarters, New York, 26 September 2014
Welcome and Opening Remarks by co-Hosts
H.E. Mr. Ali Bongo Ondimba, President of the Gabonese Republic.
H.E. Dr. Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Federal Republic of Germany.
CITES Secretary-General's remarks at the destruction of confiscated rhino horn in the Czech Republic
The recovery of the CITES-listed African black and white rhino populations in the wild over the past few decades, after being hunted close to extinction, is a great conservation success story – and for the first seven years of this century poaching levels had remained low at around ten a year.
After 2007, however, a sharp upward trend in poaching started to emerge – a trend that has continued to the point where over 1,000 rhinos were illegally killed for their horn in South Africa alone in 2013 and over 700 killed so far this year.