The 18th meeting of the Animals Committee of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) convened from 8-12 April 2002, in San José, Costa Rica.

The meeting drew together about 110 participants from governments, as well as non-governmental, international and intergovernmental organizations.
Participants met in Plenary sessions to consider a number of items, including: implementation and review of Resolution Conf. 8.9 (Rev.) on significant trade reviews; periodic review of animal taxa; registering and monitoring operations breeding Appendix I species for commercial purposes; trade in traditional medicines; transport of live animals; trade in hard corals; labelling of caviar; trade in the Black Sea bottlenose dolphin; control of captive breeding, ranching and wild harvest production systems; trade in tortoises and freshwater turtles in Southeast Asia; seahorses; sharks; sturgeon; and trade in alien species.
In addition, working and contact groups were formed to address: revision of Resolution Conf. 8.9 (Rev.); significant trade reviews of species selected by the 16th meeting of the Animals Committee; captive breeding of Appendix I species; review of animal taxa; universal labelling of caviar; transport of live animals; trade in tortoises and freshwater turtles; sharks; sturgeon; hard corals; seahorses; and ex situ production and in situ conservation.
Progress was made in a number of issues, particularly on sharks, turtles, sturgeon and revision of the process of significant trade reviews. The results of the working groups and their recommendations will be considered at the 12th meeting of the CITES Conference of the Parties (COP-12), which is scheduled for 3-15 November 2002, in Santiago, Chile. The Earth Negotiations Bulleting report outlining these discussions in detail can be found at: http://enb.iisd.org/linkages/vol21/enb2118e.html