CITES 'Introduction from the Sea': A Practical Way Forward

On 31 August 2007, TRAFFIC and ANCORS* (The Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security) convened a small group of experts to examine operational issues relating to the question of who should be responsible for issuing Introduction from the Sea (IFS) documentation under CITES for Appendix II species, and how and when this should be applied. The workshop considered the practicalities of whether documentation should be issued by the flag or port State (or some combination) and ran through a series of real examples to test the veracity of its findings.