!! At CITES CoP 19 in 2022 a number of additional plant taxa were included in the CITES Appendices and several of the # Annotations were amended. Therefore the version of the Manual for Annotations presented below is no longer up-to-date. At the moment the author does not plan to create an updated version !!
# Annotations for plants in CITES
The majority of plant species listings included in the CITES Appendices II and III are accompanied by special footnotes called “Annotations”. They are preceded by the “#” symbol. These # Annotations define which commodities are covered by the listing or are excluded from it. A common understanding of these # Annotations by enforcement officials and by exporting and importing companies is of legal as well as of conservation and economic importance.
Manual for # Annotations
To support implementation and enforcement of CITES plant listings we have prepared a Manual which is primarily directed to the CITES enforcement community, but will also be of use to other stakeholders in the CITES family.
The manual describes all # Annotations and defines the terms used in the text of the Annotations. The most innoovative part of the manual is the image based guide illustrating the commodities that are regulated by CITES and the commodities that are not regulated by CITES for the given species.
Manual versions
Versions 1.0 and 2.0 of the Manual were published in 2016 and 2018. The version 3.0 of the CITES # Annotations Manual, published in 2020, includes decisions taken by the CITES Parties at CoP 18 in 2019 (valid as of 28 August 2020).
Updates of this manual are planned in the light of forthcoming changes to the Appendices and improved understanding of trade and its commodities.
Call for feedback and suggestions
Proposals to include additional relevant commodities of CITES plants in the image section are highly welcome. Please send to uschippmann (at) yahoo (dot) de.
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by Uwe Schippmann, 19.2.2023