Tuesday, November 12, 2002 by Melissa Groo
Save the Elephants News Service Researcher Just this morning, amendments were presented by Botswana and Namibia, which were voted on by all Parties by secret ballot. The main points
in both proposals were as follows:
Annual quotas are not planned (until next COP) but decisions on a 10,000 kilogram one-time sale for Namibia and on a 20,000 kilogram one-time sale of ivory for Botswana will take place in May
2004--unless the Secretariat presents a report to the Standing Committee suggesting that the trade is detrimental to the species (i.e. the two proponents must meet the conditions outlined in the proposals which reference 10.10
rev.), and the Standing Committee subsequently votes to suspend such a sale.
Of note are a few items:
• The U.S. presented an amendment at the end of the day yesterday opposing annual quotas and to suspend any sale till the
50th meeting of the Standing Committee (which might have been in late 2004 or early 2005). This was not considered today as the Chair offered the options to the Parties to vote on the proposal with the least restriction on trade.
Therefore, the Botswana and Namibia proposals went ahead.
• There was a lot of debate today and yesterday, and many countries, including Germany, Denmark on behalf of the E.U., Ghana, the Congo, and Eritrea supported the initial
intervention by Kenya.
• Surprisingly, India, which was a co-proponent of the Appendix I proposal with Kenya, did not speak up once during the ivory debate. This could have affected at the very least the vote of Asian countries
which might have followed their lead. This might have proven vital given the narrow margin of both votes--Botswana got the required majority by two votes, and the Namibian proposal the majority by three votes.
The agenda will
return to the other elephant proposals this afternoon at 2. I will try to circulate the decisions as soon as possible.
