Letter to U.S. State Department on Mahogany Decision
12/2/99
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: CIEL to State Dept. on mahogany decision
Source: Center for International Environmental Law
1367 Connecticut Ave NW, Suite 300
Washington, DC 20036-1860
Tel: (202) 785-8700 x26
Fax: (202) 785-8701
E-mail: BassMS@aol.com
Web: www.ciel.org
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: December 2, 1999
Dear Colleagues-
I thought you would like to see this letter that David Downes wrote to
Brooks Yeager on the mahogany decision. This letter was in part
responsible for getting mahogany on the agenda for CITES COP11, but it
also expresses the frustration that many NGOs and scientists felt
about the US Government decision not to pursue an Appendix II listing.
We are releasing it now because at the time it was such a sensitive
issue.
-Margot
November 9, 1999
By Facsimile
Brooks Yeager
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Environment United States Department of
State
Washington, D.C. 20520
Fax: (202) 647-0217
Dear Brooks:
Thank you very much for taking the time on Monday to discuss
international cooperation to protect big-leaf mahogany under the
Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). This
is to confirm highlights of our conversation.
As I mentioned, I have great respect for your experience and
dedication regarding this issue and forest conservation generally.
Still, I am deeply disappointed to hear you confirm that the Clinton-
Gore Administration does not intend to file a proposal to list big-
leaf mahogany on Appendix II of CITES by the November 12 deadline.
In 1992, Al Gore, then a member of the United States Senate, urged the
United States government to maintain support for an Appendix II
listing and not to let politics override the scientific basis for
listing established by the Fish and Wildlife Service. At the last
CITES Conference of Parties in 1997, you yourself led this
Administration's commendable effort to persuade CITES Parties to
protect mahogany under Appendix II - an effort that fell short by only
a few votes of the required two-thirds majority.
CIEL is very concerned that the US seems to be withdrawing from its
former support of CITES implementation with respect to mahogany. The
scientific basis for listing is stronger now than ever. Populations
are declining in nearly all range states. The Administration's
decision disregards new evidence on file with the Fish and Wildlife
Service of severe habitat loss as well as continued overharvesting in
Central America and Mexico. Failure to implement CITES facilitates
continued illegal logging. The need for international cooperation to
bring trade to sustainable levels is increasingly urgent.
I was relieved to hear from you that the Administration will at least
ensure that big-leaf mahogany shows up on the agenda of the next CITES
Conference of the Parties in Nairobi next April. The understanding
from the last COP was that a mahogany working group would report back
to the next COP with recommendations for action. If the
Administration were to miss the chance altogether to get mahogany on
the agenda, the result would be a serious setback for tropical forest
conservation - and a serious setback for the Administration's
commitment to protect forests at the international level.
As the Administration presses ahead with liberalization of the forest
product sector at the World Trade Organization, it must at the same
time ensure parallel progress to protect forests from trade-related
threats. In recent discussions on trade and environment,
Administration officials have extolled the importance of such parallel
progress.
Yet the Administration's WTO proposal to reduce tariffs on forest
products remains its most prominent international forest initiative.
The Administration's own environmental review indicates that that
proposal may increase pressures for overharvesting in Malaysian and
Indonesian tropical forests that are hotspots of biodiversity.
Meanwhile, the Administration seems to be backing away from the chance
to make parallel progress on protecting tropical forests from trade-
related impacts at CITES - an increasingly critical safeguard
mechanism in today's globalizing economy. With the Seattle
Ministerial Conference of the WTO impending, any failure to move
forward on mahogany at CITES will deepen the environmental community's
doubts about the Clinton-Gore Administration's willingness to invest
in multilateral environmental protection on a par with trade
liberalization.
Please let me know if you have any questions or comments about this
letter. I look forward to assisting you and your colleagues in
promoting the effective implementation of CITES whenever a species
faces trade-related threats.
Best regards,
David R. Downes
Senior Attorney