April 26, 2016 — The European Union has decided not to recommend listing American Eel as an endangered species at the upcoming CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) Conference of the Parties, to be held later this year.

In a report submitted to CITES (“Conservation of and trade in Anguilla SPP.”), the EU and its Member States instead recommended funding for a study of eel species not listed as endangered by CITES and noted that data on eels in the Northeast U.S. is more comprehensive than elsewhere in the world.

The European Eel (Anguilla anguilla) has been listed in CITES Appendix II since 2009. Currently export and import of European Eel from and into the EU is illegal, and EU Member States have enacted a zero export quota for the species since 2011. That led to an increased demand for other eel species, and an increase in illegal trade. As the EU report explains, U.S. fisheries managers passed a harvest quota and regulations to limit the expansion of the harvest of American Eel (Anguilla rostrata). The U.S. harvest is restricted to one fishery in Maine and a smaller fishery in South Carolina.

The report states that, for American Eel, “there are data for most of this species’ life stages (glass, elver, yellow and silver) from the northern part of its range (Canada and central Atlantic States).” It is more critical of data on eels in the Caribbean, northern South America, and East Asia, and pushes for more information that would lead to effective conservation and management of eels.

In its recommendations, the EU encourages parties involved in the trade of eel species to provide CITES with specific information to inform a potential study, and to participate in workshops where they can share their expertise and knowledge on priority topics.

The EU report comes ahead of the CITES Seventeenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties, which will convene from September 24 to Octobers 5 in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Read the full report at the European Commission of the European Union