CITES - conserving or destroying?

[Braem]

You're right but is there no way to convince Kew and others to proceed that way? This reminds me of the days when collectors picked everything up in a place, wrecked the habitat and refused to say where their plants had came from. Are we still at that stage?

I don't know ... but I am inclined to belive that some still do ....

 

[SelectOrchids]

To be fair, now that they made the CITES, it cannot be undone, at any time or any cost.

Many not-too-educated people, or 'differently educated' people have a behavior way different from any expectation.

Let's say orchids are removed from the CITES. Some bozos in Europe, USA, and Australia will sell and buy plants happily, nothing really changed, that's it, but easier, smoother...

In Asia... well, they will collected much, much more, because if it has been prohibited it will be again, and will try to make stocks way beyond anything one could imagine. Of course too, it is not cocain or jewels, you cannot store wild life like that, but that's something they do not understand, not even in Malaysia, Thailand... and the losses if orchids can be freely traded would be a thousandfold higher.

I still remember that very angry collector, he showed me 50kg of heleneae ( same as the pictures from Cliokchi some months ago...), that were in the box for about two months, All leaves dry, so some were still dry green. He was very angry after me because I was foreigner, did not want to buy any, and told him the plants were dead. He told me 'but there is 50kg'.

If free trade was to be allowed again, extinction would occur very quickly, with massive batches from Vietnam to Taiwan, Indonesia to Japan, etc... to end up dead in nurseries after some weeks. People would store whilst still legal until it is banned again, hoping for the big bucks. When paphs were placed on App I, some WWF technical advisor actually warned his customers ( it was confidential in the early days), and sent the hell out of Asia to them. Needless to say that those massive quantites could not be cared of, and died after some months.

When they started the CITES, they did not think about the fact that they 'priced' everything on their lists. As a matter of fact, any change or move forward is a permanent one, that cannot be undone anytime.

 

[Marc]

as I mentioned at the Paph symposium in Apopka a couple of years ago, the US commercial entities are the ones who would benefit from an amended CITES because then foreign vendors would not be able to openly develope plants that are of questionable legality here! Therefore they should get involved.

So you want CITES to include the horror that is called the Lacey act ( if I'm not mistaken ) in it's own rules so that it applies to the whole of the world?

 

[troy]

Defenitely worth reading these posts!!!

 

[PaphLover]

You got to be joking. They are fortified with machine guns aiming at you. Don't you read "Orchid Fever"?? They raided nurseries in Europe with a military precision and personnel armed with machine guns????

Thank you for mentioning this book. I couldn't put it down and was up until 3:30am reading it. Fascinating!

I've read many books on growing orchids, but other than The Orchid Thief, I haven't read many books about the orchid world. Suggestions for others or to a thread listing others would be greatly appreciated.

 

[mormodes]

Thank you for mentioning this book. I couldn't put it down and was up until 3:30am reading it. Fascinating!

I've read many books on growing orchids, but other than The Orchid Thief, I haven't read many books about the orchid world. Suggestions for others or to a thread listing others would be greatly appreciated.

Craig Pittman's book 'The Scent of Scandal' came out in 2012 - after the dates of this thread, so I don't think anyone had mentioned it. About Phrag kovachii.