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For your information! All Dalbergia included EI Rosewood will be listed on CITES II starting in January 2017. Next year you need a CITES Dokument for selling Guitars with Dalbergia spp.
Ethan, I’m not good in reading between the lines, because I’m not a native speaker. But I think you are not happy about my post. Sorry for that, but this is not a secret, this will become a Law for all of use sooner or later! We have to deal with that, and we find ways for using this or other wood. The time will come and a lot of wood will be listed in the CITES Appendix no. I like RIO. Personally I am relaxed about this; we will see how the market works next year. I have registered all my wood that I have in Stock, which was very easy. So there will be no problem becoming a CITES Certificate for my guitars in future. For the wood I will buy in the future, I will see what’s happened on the market! We all have to think more and more about non tropical Woods for guitar building in the future. For sure we all can build good guitars without tropical woods in the future!
Ethan was happy with your post Vince don't worry about.
I don't see there being any issues with IRW most of the stuff that we get these days is plantation. In most cases cites is pointless except when the wood is going to cross a border that really polices CITES. I haven't heard of anyone having trouble in Europe.
Ethan im sorry, i read your post on my phone between the doors. Im reading somthing like "heats up"!
SEden, my Dealer (Siccas Guitars) here in Germany says to me "Starting from January 2017, i cant buy any guitar made from Rosewood without a CITES Dokument from you or other Makers" ..."We take this very seriously"
My local Administration (Regeirungspräsidium) says "When you sell a guitar made from Rosewood after the new CITES come into effect (02.01.2017 + 90 Days ~ 30. March) you commit an offense in case there is no certificate"
I am going to be very careful what I say because I yesterday I offended a friend by speaking without thinking (on this same subject).
As far as I know, if a wood species is in Appendix II, the restrictions are not the same as Appendix I. Madagascar Rosewood is in Appendix II so we can take that as an example although I have no information that Indian Rosewood will be treated in the same way. Madagascar R. is restricted only in raw wood form including logs, sawn sets and veneer. However, no import permit is needed, only an export permit. Furthermore, once it is made into a guitar it is not restricted because it is a finished consumer product. The idea is to make it hard to get the wood out of the country of origin to discourage logging of the species. For guitar-makers this means that we can continue to buy these woods and continue to sell guitars made with them without CITES certification because no certification exisits for these woods. On the other hand you can buy Dalbergia nigra (Appendix I) and you will get a certificate which will later allow you to sell the guitar to someone in another country. It doesn't matter who you ask for your certification for a guitar, they will not give it to you for anything in Appendix II.
So the question is not that we need to get our Indian Rosewood certified but rather we need to make sure that the authorities have a record of it before it gets into Appendix I so that they will give us the certification when it becomes possible and necessary. Contact the regulatory organisation which monitors CITES compliance in your country and ask them what to do.
Of course it is an offence. I'm not saying it isn't, I'm just saying that most will not care. I still see a lot of guitars with BRW and MRW all with no certificates crossing the borders with no problems.
Of course all of this is pointless as the main offender is China who I assume doesn't recognise CITES. It should stop the export of illegal woods but it hasn't worked so far on any of the other woods as it still all goes to China.
RE: CITES Indien Rosewood (in reply to johnguitar)
quote:
ORIGINAL: johnguitar As far as I know, if a wood species is in Appendix II, the restrictions are not the same as Appendix I. Madagascar Rosewood is in Appendix II so we can take that as an example although I have no information that Indian Rosewood will be treated in the same way. Madagascar R. is restricted only in raw wood form including logs, sawn sets and veneer. However, no import permit is needed, only an export permit. Furthermore, once it is made into a guitar it is not restricted because it is a finished consumer product. The idea is to make it hard to get the wood out of the country of origin to discourage logging of the species. For guitar-makers this means that we can continue to buy these woods and continue to sell guitars made with them without CITES certification because no certification exisits for these woods.
The entire Dalbergia genus has been moved to Appendix II (regulated trade) except Brazilian rosewood is still in Appendix I (no commercial trade). For more details and background, see the CoP17 Prop. 55 detailed proposal - it is 50 pages - available at https://cites.org/sites/default/files/eng/cop/17/prop/060216/E-CoP17-Prop-55.pdf
This starts 90 days from CITES adopting it. They adopted it in early October, and posted a notice on November 7. Here's the notice (page 6): https://cites.org/sites/default/files/notif/E-Notif-2016-057.pdf which specifies Jan 2, 2017 starting date for the new rules.
For East Indian rosewood (and other new entrants) this means that Appendix II rules start to apply - they are in Article IV of the CITES convention at https://cites.org/eng/disc/text.php#IV (see below).
You are right that this mostly involves regulating through (re-)export permitting. For existing wood stock, it generally means getting a "pre-convention certificate" or equivalent. For the US, for example, the form is this: https://www.fws.gov/forms/3-200-23.pdf
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According to the report Estevan linked, the Chinese are not gobbling up dalbergia latifolia, the "indian Rosewood" commonly used in guitars, but they are consuming huge quantities of Dalbergia stevensonii (Honduran rosewood), Milletia laurentii (Wenge/African rosewood), and Dalbergia melanoxylon (Ebony or African Blackwood), all of which are used in guitar making, though less often than Indian Rosewood.
There's a good bit of Chinese style "rosewood" furniture for sale in Hawai'i and Guam, though all that I have looked at closely has been cheaper wood with a relatively uniform fine grain pattern, stained a phony shade of red.
Most Indian rosewood you find these days is more than likely plantation grown. I'm pretty sure most of my stock is and I find it really difficult to find anything not plantation grown. I am happy with that though as I know it is better controlled. Also, India already have tight regulations regarding the export of Indian rosewood. Anything above certain dimensions cannot leave India unless it has had some form of carpentry work done to it. There for you cannot buy logs of Indian Rosewood.
The report does say that all Dalbergia and a few other genus has been added to the list simply to stop banned species being passed off as not banned rosewood. This helps officials and should prevent a lot of illegal logging exports.
For your information! All Dalbergia included EI Rosewood will be listed on CITES II starting in January 2017. Next year you need a CITES Dokument for selling Guitars with Dalbergia spp.
I remember that a Dalbergia nigra document used to cost about 12 dollars in Germany years ago compared to a closure in the US. This cost enabled guitar makers in Germany to produce and ship guitars to where the US was basically shut down from, out of the country, sales.
I had a Brazilian girl who lived with us years ago whose father owned the largest (lumber) company in Curvello. He sent his man to Amazonia to where Jacaranda trees were just laying on the ground, and cut a beautiful board, about 10 guitars worth, and he could not get it out of the country, for me, in raw board form to where the German loggers had some kind of deal to ship their rosewood out of the country in raw board form.
I thought, at the time, that the Germans took care of their guitar makers a lot better than the US government. Consequently the Brazilians burned down a lot of their forest land for farming, so did the beautiful Jacaranda go up in smoke. A sad statement to a beautiful species of wood that could have been a lasting tribute to the art.
I have been in regular communication with Fish and Wildlife here in the U.S in regards to our issues and more so now due to the recent listing. Here are the bullet points
1) CITES is made up of 181 countries. It is up to each country to enforce the laws as they see fit. Therefore we have little consistency between countries. This is a big big problem IMO but it also means you need to know what your country is doing and how they are implementing these laws.
2) All rosewoods are on CITES app II with _no_annotations meaning exceptions for form they take. It used to be that Madgascar rosewood was on app II with the only exception being finished goods. Therefore selling wood internationally or buying it was different than selling a finished good (which required no permits). This is no longer the case. Finished goods are treated the same are raw materials.
3) D Nigra, aka Brazilian rosewood is still app I and all the same rules apply as they did before,
4) In the U.S there will be no international movement of rosewood in either raw or finished form without import permits. If I choose to export then I need a permit. The requirements for getting permits is simple, if you are importing wood then all the required verification should be there. If you are sending out a guitar for example they are aware of our stockpiling activities are not (at least in what they tell me) going to be looking for much more than a signed statement of when and how you got your wood.
5) Non commercial movement is not impacted. In other words a musician, even if traveling to a paying gig, can move around without a permit (as long as there is no D Nigra in there)
6) Warranty work, as long as it is not being compensated is also free to ship without permits.
7)At least here in the U.S, the authorities are not really happy with how all encompassing these measures are and seem to be a bit more sympathetic to our plight. They have also informed me that they expect some reassessment and redress at the next CITES convention in three years. Until then though this is what we have to deal with.
My understanding is that they apply to guitars SOLD after jan 1st 2017.
Be aware that interpretations can de found. I asked Cites Denmark what was needed if I sold a guitar to an Australian client that came to my workshop and picked up the guitar. I was told that since it was sold within the EU, it wasnt an export and so did not need any CITES papers. CITES Australia said it needed Cites papers. It makes totally sense, because burocracy has always been like that.
I asked Cites Denmark what was needed if I sold a guitar to an Australian client that came to my workshop and picked up the guitar. I was told that since it was sold within the EU, it wasnt an export and so did not need any CITES papers. CITES Australia said it needed Cites papers. It makes totally sense, because burocracy has always been like that.
Well this does make sense, given that the rule is about wood export but is typically being enforced at the point of import to another country.
So as far as the EU is concerned, a commercial transaction happened within its borders, so export did not even enter the equation. But as soon as that client tries to return to Australia, they will ask him for his export certificate to prove it is a legitimate purchase of App II wood (we are assuming non-Brazilian rosewood). So if the Australian guy ever wants to leave the EU, he better get an export certificate, and might as well do it at the time of the commercial transaction.
Do these rules apply to instruments of a certain date? For example a guitar with 2017 on the label vs 1973??
Case 1: Brazilian rosewood.
It is on CITES Annex I since 1992 and all commercial activities and any movements across borders are prohibited unless permitted in certain circumstances for which a permit is obtained first. If your guitar is shown to have been made before 1992, you get a certificate/passport for it and once you get it, you can travel with it across borders. As far as selling it, I think you have to get an exemption/permit for that as well - if it is even allowed - again based on it being "pre-convention" guitar.
Case 2: all other rosewood.
All of it is on CITES Annex II since Jan 1, 2017. Non-commercial travel across borders is permitted if the amount of rosewood is less than 10kg (not the weight of the guitar, but of the rosewood - so in practice every guitar would have no problem fitting within that exemption). All other transactions across borders are controlled through an export certificate. In practice this means that an export certificate for a 2017+ guitar has to be obtained from the seller if you ever intend to sell the guitar later to be taken abroad - otherwise you would run into problems at the time of that later transaction. So it is like the documents showing the legality of the rosewood in the guitar have to follow the guitar. For pre-2017 guitars, likely some registration of it and/or a document would be available once you demonstrate it is pre-convention. Then it is presumably trivial to get an export certificate if you sell it abroad - but you still need one as the country of import will ask for it. So the pre vs. post-convention distinction only matters in terms of pre-convention rosewood not needing a trail of provenance and thus the distinction only matters a lot to luthiers with piles of rosewood stock.
P.S. In both cases there is a scenario where the rosewood can be pre-convention but used to make a guitar post-convention. Presumably the pre-convention rules would apply since the rules are built around the vintage of the wood; it may just be potentially harder in practice to prove your case for a passport, permit, or certificate, and will likely raise flags with authorities in the field each time you move with the guitar.
From my recent experience. It's not actually difficult to get an export permit and not all countries require an import permit so you have to assess each case individually.
Two examples of this is that the USA do not require an import permit for CITES II listed rosewood. They just make sure the export papers were in order.
Japan on the other hand do require an import permit for CITES II so if you were to ship to Japan the importer would have to get the required import permit and give the documents to the sender prior to the guitar even being booked for shipping.
I am not sure about guitars being picked up yet. I will ask someone that will know and come back to you on it. I would assume though that it would now be classed as a personal item and would fall under the 10kg heading so would not need an import permit or export permit.
As for future proofing. CITES II listed woods don't appear to need permanent permits as such, they just need a paper trail. Again I will ask someone in the know what is classed as proof for say a 1990 Indian rosewood guitar with no previous invoices kept.
I asked Cites Denmark what was needed if I sold a guitar to an Australian client that came to my workshop and picked up the guitar. I was told that since it was sold within the EU, it wasnt an export and so did not need any CITES papers. CITES Australia said it needed Cites papers. It makes totally sense, because burocracy has always been like that.
Well this does make sense, given that the rule is about wood export but is typically being enforced at the point of import to another country.
So as far as the EU is concerned, a commercial transaction happened within its borders, so export did not even enter the equation. But as soon as that client tries to return to Australia, they will ask him for his export certificate to prove it is a legitimate purchase of App II wood (we are assuming non-Brazilian rosewood). So if the Australian guy ever wants to leave the EU, he better get an export certificate, and might as well do it at the time of the commercial transaction.
Well, actually it could be looked at in another way and thats what the Danish authorities believe: The guitar is bought within the EU and doesnt need CITES and since a privat person can travel free with a personal instrument without cites papers (except app 1) there´s no need to make any paperwork.
Personally I dont care what is right or wrong. I just want to stay out of trouble and help my clients. So the old burocracy rule works here as well: Make all the paperwork that is possible, even though it may not be necessary. That way you have kind of peace in mind and you will hopefully stay out of trouble. It has the benefit of keeping the jobs in the little offices and you also know why you have to pay so much in tax..
I asked Cites Denmark what was needed if I sold a guitar to an Australian client that came to my workshop and picked up the guitar. I was told that since it was sold within the EU, it wasnt an export and so did not need any CITES papers. CITES Australia said it needed Cites papers. It makes totally sense, because burocracy has always been like that.
Well this does make sense, given that the rule is about wood export but is typically being enforced at the point of import to another country.
So as far as the EU is concerned, a commercial transaction happened within its borders, so export did not even enter the equation. But as soon as that client tries to return to Australia, they will ask him for his export certificate to prove it is a legitimate purchase of App II wood (we are assuming non-Brazilian rosewood). So if the Australian guy ever wants to leave the EU, he better get an export certificate, and might as well do it at the time of the commercial transaction.
Well, actually it could be looked at in another way and thats what the Danish authorities believe: The guitar is bought within the EU and doesnt need CITES and since a privat person can travel free with a personal instrument without cites papers (except app 1) there´s no need to make any paperwork.
From Australia's point of view, that person left without a guitar and came back with a guitar. So this is not the same as leaving and returning with the same guitar. I think the US already has specific instructions that this is not a gray area - i.e. you have to have left and returned with the same guitar for it to count as non-commercial movement not needing a certificate. Of course as as practical matter maybe nothing will happen at the point of entry - but you are playing the odds and some people may not be comfortable with that.
I used to think that a gray area existed where you happen to travel around, then on a whim decide to buy a guitar where you are as a visitor, then from the point of becoming the guitar's owner it is yours so therefore the return trip to your home country is you travelling with your personal guitar as a non-commercial movement. However, authorities in at least the US and probably elsewhere are making it explicit in their guidelines that the non-commerical travel exception only applies if you left and returned with the same guitar - which makes logical sense in terms of the intent of the rule, though it is annoying being applied to guitars and furniture in the same way.
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