Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species

Also known as: CITES · Washington Convention · Washington Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species · CITES Convention — loose usage in Philippine agency documents

Society

Definition

The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), also known as the Washington Convention, is the 1973 multilateral treaty that subjects international trade in wild animals and plants to a global permit system so that trade “does not threaten the survival of the species in the wild” — drafted after a 1963 IUCN resolution, finalized at Washington, D.C., on 3 March 1973 by representatives of eighty countries, in force from 1 July 1975, and now counting 185 parties covering more than 40,900 species. (Wikipedia — CITES, Wikisource — CITES text) Its machinery, in the treaty’s own text, is the three-appendix ladder of Article II: “Appendix I shall include all species threatened with extinction which are or may be affected by trade,” in which trade “must only be authorized in exceptional circumstances”; “Appendix II shall include” species which “may become so unless trade… is subject to strict regulation,” together with look-alike species; and “Appendix III shall include all species which any Party identifies as being subject to regulation within its jurisdiction” and “needing the co-operation of other Parties in the control of trade” — the Parties not allowing trade in listed species “except in accordance with the provisions of the present Convention,” through permits issued by national Management Authorities advised by Scientific Authorities. (Wikisource — CITES text)

The Philippine strand is substantial. The Philippines ratified on 18 August 1981, the convention entering into force for the country on 16 November 1981, with the authorities this wiki’s environment cluster carries: the Biodiversity Management Bureau (BMB) of the DENR as Management Authority for terrestrial species, the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources for aquatic and marine species, and the Palawan Council for Sustainable Development for Palawan — scientific authorities in the Ecosystems Research and Development Bureau, the National Museum, and UP Los Baños, and enforcement focal points in the Bureau of Customs and the National Bureau of Investigation. (CITES — Philippines country profile) The domestic anchor is Republic Act No. 9147, the Wildlife Resources Conservation and Protection Act of 2001, whose Section 19 designates the same authorities and whose permits and penalties make CITES obligations enforceable in Philippine courts. (RA No. 9147 — LawPhil, eCITES PH — About Us)

Identities

Source Type	Identity
Wikipedia	CITES
Wikidata	CITES (Q191836) — “multilateral treaty to protect endangered plants and animals”; aliases include Washington Convention (verified this session)
DBpedia	CITES — label verified on the data endpoint this session
ProductOntology	N/A
Wiktionary	endangered species — noun compound headword (verified this session)
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)	Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (1973 March 3) — name authority n80017747 (verified this session via id.loc.gov names suggest)
MeSH	Endangered Species — descriptor D056727 (verified this session via the NLM ID lookup)
NCBI Taxonomy	Representative Philippine Appendix I taxa verified this session: Pithecophaga jefferyi (taxid 321089), the Philippine eagle; Manis culionensis (taxid 1836949), the Philippine pangolin
AGROVOC	N/A for the treaty itself; biodiversity (c_33949) — the convention’s object — verified this session via the AGROVOC LOD
Google Scholar	CITES Washington Convention 1973 Appendices permits non-detriment finding Conference of the Parties Philippines ratification 1981 BMB DENR BFAR RA 9147 Section 19 management authority Philippine eagle pangolin Appendix I wildlife trafficking seizures
ConceptNet	N/A — ConceptNet API unreachable this session (HTTP 502)
OpenCyc	N/A

Also Known As

CITES
Washington Convention
Washington Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species
CITES Convention — loose usage in Philippine agency documents

Examples and Analogies

A three-speed protection ladder: Appendix I shuts commercial international trade in wild specimens of extinction-threatened species — import and export permits both required; Appendix II regulates trade that could push a species toward extinction — export permit only, most of the listings; Appendix III is one Party’s request for help policing its own protected species. (Wikisource — CITES text, Wikipedia — CITES)
The permit as border valve: every legal movement — import, export, re-export, introduction from the sea — requires a permit or certificate issued before it occurs; in the Philippines the valve is now electronic, the BMB’s eCITES PH portal. (Wikipedia — CITES, eCITES PH — About Us)
The scientist’s signature under the trader’s paper: export is permitted only after “a Scientific Authority of the State of export has advised that such export will not be detrimental to the survival of that species” — why the National Museum, UPLB, and ERDB sit on the Philippine authority list. (Wikisource — CITES text, CITES — Philippines country profile)
The Philippine faces of Appendix I: the Philippine eagle (Pithecophaga jefferyi), the critically endangered national bird, and the Philippine pangolin (Manis culionensis), the Palawan endemic called balintong — uplisted with all pangolins in 2016, prohibiting commercial international trade. (List of CITES Appendix I species, Philippine pangolin, Philippine eagle)
Verified treaty and national data:
Treaty: signed Washington, D.C., 3 March 1973; amended at Bonn, 22 June 1979; in force 1 July 1975; 185 parties as of June 2025 (Wikisource — CITES text, Wikipedia — CITES)
CoP: regular meetings “at least once every two years, unless the Conference decides otherwise” — in practice about every three years; Appendix amendments by a two-thirds majority present and voting (Wikisource — CITES text, Wikipedia — CITES)
Philippines: ratification 18 August 1981; entry into force 16 November 1981; reservations on three Appendix I parrot taxa (Amazona auropalliata, Amazona oratrix, Primolius couloni) in effect from 13 February 2003 (CITES — Philippines country profile)

Usage Scenarios

1. Philippine Export and Import Permitting

Every legal cross-border movement of a listed Philippine species runs through the Section 19 authorities: exporters apply to the BMB through eCITES PH for a permit supported by a scientific-authority determination, aquatic species route to BFAR, Palawan transactions to the PCSD. (RA No. 9147 — LawPhil, eCITES PH — About Us, CITES — Philippines country profile)

2. Enforcing Against Illegal Wildlife Trade

Seizure and prosecution practice pairs the treaty’s permit requirement with RA 9147’s prohibited acts and graduated penalties — killing a critically endangered species carries up to twelve years’ imprisonment and fines to one million pesos — with Customs and the NBI’s Environmental Crime Division as the convention’s named focal points. (RA No. 9147 — LawPhil, CITES — Philippines country profile)

3. Amending the Appendices at the CoP

Listing proposals for Appendices I and II are voted at the Conference of the Parties by two-thirds majority, over range-state objections if necessary — the mechanism that put all pangolin species, the Philippine pangolin among them, on Appendix I in 2016; Appendix III changes a Party may make unilaterally. (Wikipedia — CITES, Philippine pangolin)

4. Researching Philippine Treaty Commitments

The Philippines’ ratification, authority designations, and reservations are published on the convention’s country profile — the entry point for tracing how a global treaty becomes Philippine bureau practice. (CITES — Philippines country profile)

Strategies

Regulate at the border, legislate at home: the treaty binds parties but is a framework, not a police code — each party “must adopt their own domestic legislation to implement CITES at the national level,” the Philippine implementation being RA 9147. (Wikipedia — CITES, RA No. 9147 — LawPhil)
Negative list by design: trade is lawful unless listed — the architecture that concentrates enforcement on the listed taxa, and the standing criticism that unlisted threatened species trade legally by default. (Wikipedia — CITES)
Take stricter measures if you wish: parties may exceed the convention, the headroom Philippine law uses when national threatened-species lists run stricter than the appendices. (Wikipedia — CITES, RA No. 9147 — LawPhil)
Reserve, then trade as a non-party: within ninety days of a listing amendment a party may reserve and be treated as a non-party for that species — the device behind the Philippine parrot reservations of 2003. (Wikipedia — CITES, CITES — Philippines country profile)

Security and Safety Measures

Permits before movement: no trade in listed specimens “except in accordance with” the permit system, presented to border authorities in advance — legality documented before the transaction, not litigated after. (Wikisource — CITES text, Wikipedia — CITES)
The non-detriment finding as scientific gate: an export permit requires the Scientific Authority’s advice that the export “will not be detrimental to the survival of that species” — biological review standing between commerce and the species. (Wikisource — CITES text)
Narrow exemptions, tightly drawn: pre-Convention specimens, personal and household effects, captive-bred and artificially propagated specimens, and registered scientific exchange follow special procedures, each conditioned on documented legal acquisition. (Wikipedia — CITES)
For researchers: date the Philippine strand precisely — ratification 18 August 1981, entry into force 16 November 1981 — and cite the authorities from the convention’s own country profile, since RA 9147 still names the bureau by its former style (PAWB), the caution this wiki’s BMB entry registers. (CITES — Philippines country profile, RA No. 9147 — LawPhil)

Historical Context

The convention grew from an IUCN resolution of 1963, was finalized at Washington, D.C., on 3 March 1973, entered into force on 1 July 1975, and by June 2025 counted 185 parties — the European Union admitted by the Gaborone Amendment of 1983, effective 2013; the treaty text was amended at Bonn on 22 June 1979. (Wikipedia — CITES, Wikisource — CITES text)

The Philippines joined in the convention’s second decade, ratifying on 18 August 1981 — the Marcos-era accession that preceded by two decades the statute that would implement it. (CITES — Philippines country profile) RA 9147, approved July 30, 2001, committed the state to its “commitments to international conventions on wildlife protection” and in Section 19 wired the convention into Philippine administration: the Protected Areas and Wildlife Bureau — today’s BMB — for terrestrial species, BFAR for aquatic, the PCSD for Palawan. (RA No. 9147 — LawPhil) Since then the relationship has matured through the bureau’s eCITES PH portal, and the appendices have closed on the country’s most traded species — the 2016 uplisting that put Manis culionensis on Appendix I. (eCITES PH — About Us, Philippine pangolin, List of CITES Appendix I species)

Challenges and Controversies

Enforcement Capacity Against Trafficking

The convention’s own record carries the gap — as of 2002 half the parties lacked one or more of the four requirements (designated authorities, prohibitory legislation, penalties, confiscation powers) — and the 2022 Cambodian macaque case, in which CITES documents allegedly laundered wild-caught animals into research trade, is the standing example of paperwork defeated at source. (Wikipedia — CITES)

Jurisdictional Complexity in Philippine Implementation

The Philippine authority map — three management authorities, four scientific authorities, four enforcement focal points — multiplies the offices in any single transaction, the complexity this wiki’s wildlife act entry documents and the amendment bills sought to manage. (CITES — Philippines country profile, RA No. 9147 — LawPhil)

Listing Politics

Appendix decisions are two-thirds votes over range-state objections — the elephant-ivory and rhino-horn debates recur at every CoP — and critics note listings can raise black-market prices before protection reaches the field; the convention cannot address habitat loss or domestic demand. (Wikipedia — CITES)

The Reservations Loophole

The Philippine reservations of 2003 on three Appendix I parrots illustrate the treaty’s escape hatch — a reserving party trades in the species as if a non-party — tolerated to keep states inside the framework, criticized as its self-inflicted leak. (CITES — Philippines country profile, Wikipedia — CITES)