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Arjan Hassing and Patience Mayaki
CITES Student Conference of the Parties (SCoP)
 On the 10th and 11th of May 2007, the CITES SCoP took place in the beautiful “Het Spaansche Hof”, a city palace in the centre of the Hague, and was organised by TEIMUN. In total 24 students from different universities were participating in this event. Although most students were from Dutch universities (6 from Wageningen UR), the group existed for a great part of international students – a nice reflection of the international character of CITES. Each student had to represent another country.
CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) is an international multilateral agreement between governments, aiming at ensuring that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival. More than 33000 species are listed in the several appendices of the convention, in which is determined whether international trade should be limited and strictly monitored, or even completely prohibited.
Once every two or three years all associated countries and states (the Parties, 171 in total at this point of time) meet to discuss and negotiate on various issues under the CITES mandate. In 2007 this event, the 14th Conference of Parties (CoP), is taking place in the EU for the first time. This will happen in the World Forum Convention Centre in the Hague, from the 3rd till the 15th of June 2007.
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 During the SCoP in May, students were given the opportunity to discuss the topics that are on the agenda of the real conference, in a formal setting, acting as student delegates of various member states. After the official opening by the Gerda Verburg, (Minister of LNV; Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality) and Willem Wijnstekers (Secretary General of CITES), the student conference started, led by an official chair. This provided a great opportunity for participating students to gain some international experience in lobbying, strategic negotiating and discussing topics related to international trade. Different forms of caucus were practiced, motions were raised and numerous votings were conducted, just as during the real conference. This eventually led to the acceptance and rejection of several amendments in the appendices.
The last ballot vote that took place was an election in which two students were selected to present the results of the student conference at the real CoP. Patience Mayaki and Arjan Hassing from Wageningen University (both students from the MSc Forest and Nature Conservation, specialisation ‘Policy’) were elected to do so on the 4th of June 2007, in the Hague.
More information can be found under the following links:
Site CITES http://www.cites.org/
Site CoP 14 http://www.cites.org/eng/news/meetings/cop14.shtml
Site SCoP http://www.teimun.org/cites.html |