Corals used in jewelry fail to win UN trade curbs: ‘Vanity has once again trumped conservation’
By Alister Doyle in Oslo
(Reuters) – A U.N. conference rejected on Sunday trade restrictions on red and pink corals used in jewelry in what environmentalists called a new setback for endangered marine species. Delegates at the 175-nation meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in Doha failed to back a U.S. and European Union proposal to limit trade in 31 species of corals, found from the Pacific to the Mediterranean. “Vanity has once again trumped conservation,” said David Allison of Oceana, which calls itself the world’s largest international ocean conservation group, of the decision that would have affected trade worth tens of millions of dollars. “Today is yet another example of CITES failing to protect endangered marine species,” he said. On Friday, the March 13-25 conference also rejected a proposal to ban trade in bluefin tuna, prized as sushi in Japan. Sunday’s coral proposal fell short of the needed two-thirds majority by mustering 64 votes in favor with 59 against and 10 abstentions, delegates said. The proposed restrictions would have stopped short of a trade ban but required countries to ensure better regulations and to ensure that stocks of the slow-growing corals, in the family coralliidae, were sustainably harvested. Catches have dropped to about 50 metric tones a year in the main coral grounds in the Pacific and the Mediterranean from about 450 metric tones in the mid-1980s, the U.S. and EU proposal said. … “Without the trade control measures this would have introduced, the current overharvesting of these precious corals will continue unabated,” said Ernie Cooper of TRAFFIC Canada. …
