COP21 logo
Source: Courtesy COP21
Segolene Royal, French Minster of ecology and President of COP21, has signed a decree banning trade in elephant ivory and rhino horn on the national territory, except special exemption. This order affects all species of elephant and rhino. This is in addition to the suspension of re-exports of raw ivory elephant effective since January 27, 2015, This Order provides the following new provisions:
1. Trade in Antiquities (crafted objects dating from before 1947), currently free of CITES documents, will be subject to derogation in each case.
2. The trade and catering objects crafted from after March 1947 and before 1 July 1975 will remain possible, subject to obtaining prior, case by case, the intra-EU Certificate (CIC) provided by CITES regulation.
3. Trade and commercial use of raw ivory will be banned regardless of the age of the ivory. The order also prohibited throughout the country and at any time the transport for commercial purposes, peddling, commercial use, offering for sale, sale or purchase of defenses and objects composed of or part ivory species of elephant or rhino horn.
4. The manufacture of objects using ivory is prohibited, regardless the age of the ivory used.
5. The ivory object of restoration produced after 1 July 1975 will be prohibited, regardless of the age of the ivory used.
6. The sale of ivory products produced after 1 July 1975 will be prohibited, even if the owner of this object is able to establish the legality of the purchase.
THE DECREE GOES BEYOND TEH PROVISIONS IN FORCE IN THE EU REGULATIONS----------------------------------
This decree goes beyond the provisions in force in the European Union. Regulation (EC) No 338/97 implementing CITES within the EU provides for a general exemption for trade in items made before 1 June 1947, whose trade is not subject to any document specific. This order does not change the conditions of detention privately ivory and horn, whose detention is free.
Announced in Nairobi on April 30, this measure responds to the call of the 29 members of the Coalition for African States African Elephant: Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Comoros, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon , Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, ivory Coast, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Uganda, CAR, Congo, DRC, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Chad, Togo.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This decree was submitted for public consultation which raised 2551 opinion between June 7 and July 7, a figure well above the average of the public consultation, notably equivalent to that recorded in the preparation of the wolf. This order complements the measures already taken by Ségolène Royal, in 2014, to fight against the trafficking of endangered species:
· Immediate suspension of the issuing of export licenses raw ivory by France.----------------------------------------------------------
· Call the other Member States of the European Union to ban in turn exports of raw ivory, as is already including Germany, Sweden and the United Kingdom in 2014.
· Enhanced cooperation between the services of the Ministry of Environment and customs and revival of the interdepartmental cooperation plan for improving the synergy between services to make the fight against fraud more effective, particularly at the borders.
· Strengthening the penalties for trafficking of protected species (elephants, rhinos, tigers, tropical timber varieties, etc ...). The law of reconquest of biodiversity, nature and landscape, adopted on 20 July, the fines tenfold when mere infringement (they spend 15 000-150 000) and multiplied by five for trafficking by an organized group, (150 000 to 750 000).
