Canada versus Endangered Species?

Last year, Canada became the first country in the 40 years since CITES was set up, to opt out of every proposed resolution for protecting new endangered species from international trade.

CITES (The Convention of International Trade of Endangered Species) proposed the extended protection to 76 species who have newly entered the Endangered Species list. 180 countries voted in favour of extending the protection, whereas Canada said that it expressed reservations and therefore could not sign.

So Canada has expressed 76 reservations! This compares with Iceland who in the last 40 years has expressed 22, Japan 18 and the UK 8. Meanwhile the USA has expressed no reservations.

Canada has found itself at the centre of a number of Environmental scandals in the past 5 years, most notably with its pursuit of extracting shale oil from its central provinces. For a Western Economy this large to publicly express this opinion is really concerning for environmental protection. See the links below to read more about Canada's decisions and also about the CITES programme.

http://www.cites.org/

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/canada-opts-not-to-block-international-trade-in-76-endangered-species-1.2867437