that is seen by the Administration. Surely we are not suggesting that there is a GATT connotation to trading in endangered species. Are you familiar with the briefings we have received that there is some Administration challenge on this legislation because of concerns that would confound some of the goals that we are trying to achieve in GATT?

Mr. HAYDEN. Well, we certainly have had long and lengthy discussions with the Trade Representative's Office and they have raised the GATT issue. We point to the fact that the EC, which is a member of GATT, has already moved to restrict the trade and, in fact, is even going to move to restrict the non-CITES species very soon. And we don't believe, from the Department, that it is a GATT violation.

But we respect the opinion of the USTR's office, too. It is their job to deal with the GATT issues. We have tried to design this bill in such a way as to gain the maximum support from the Trade Representative's Office and we hope if there are any GATT problems, that those can be worked out. We don't think there are problems, given the course that the EC has taken.

Mr. Goss. That is good news. I presume if there are problems that are of substance that we will be alerted to it. It seems to me that is a little bit of a red herring and I hope that is not going to stand in our way.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. STUDDS. The gentleman from New York.

Mr. HOCHBRUECKNER. Mr. Hayden, should the Secretary of Interior be given the discretion ability to require marking of birds in trade and, if so, do you believe this would aid in enforcement efforts?

Mr. HAYDEN. We don't have a pronounced position on that. Certainly, if you give that flexibility to the Secretary, it would be one more management tool or control tool which the Fish and Wildlife Service could utilize, as long as it was discretionary. I would hate to see it become mandatory in the legislation. If you want to give us additional control tools, we will try to utilize those with discretion.

Mr. HOCHBRUECKNER. Thank you. There are complaints that section 9 of H.R. 5013 which authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to implement CITES-would allow the Secretary to band the commercial pet market and all fish, reptiles, amphibians and all nondomesticated animals. In your view, what does section 9 entitle the Secretary to do?

Mr. HAYDEN. Our reading is that it would give the explicit authority to promulgate rules and regulations implementing CITES decisions, which the Fish and Wildlife Service needs to more effectively implement CITES here in the United States. CITES does not have overall authority to regulate many of the things which you referred to and therefore, in our opinion, section 9 does not apply to them.

Mr. HOCHBRUECKNER. Well, does the availability of section 9, in your view, help or hinder the ability of this bill to become law?

Mr. HAYDEN. I don't know that it should really have a major impact on the passage of the legislation. What it will do is give us greater authority to regulate the CITES species, which are some of

the species this bill relates to and gives us authority and control over. But I don't see it as a major provision that should shortstop the bill either way.

Mr. HOCHBRUECKNER. Thank you, Mr. Hayden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. STUDDS. The gentleman from California.

Mr. ANDERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hayden, thank you for being here and I hope you have enjoyed the inflatable globes that I sent you.

My understanding is seven individual bird traders are responsible for roughly 90 percent of the wild-caught birds annually imported into the United States and, furthermore, all these individuals are currently under investigation for violations of current trade laws.

What is the current status of these investigations and have any charges been brought against these individuals?

Mr. HAYDEN. Before I let John Doggett answer that question, let me say that I have taken the globe and given it to my 11-year-old daughter to study geography. Recently, when I saw you on television, I pointed out there was the kind gentleman who bestowed that globe upon her. She wants me to thank you personally for it. I would let John Doggett, our Chief of Law Enforcement, answer the question if I might, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chairman, briefly, in the month of January this year, the Fish and Wildlife Service closed down a covert portion of an investigation we have been conducting for the past threeand-a-half years.

Mr. STUDDS. Excuse me. Could you bring the mike a little closer? Mr. DOGGETT. We concluded an undercover investigation we have been conducting for three-and-a-half years into the wild bird trade, where our Covert Operations Unit set up a quarantine station and became a bird importer and worked itself into the international market. The covert portion was concluded with an arrest of an individual from New Zealand smuggling birds into the United States. He has pled guilty and is currently in prison. He is giving evidence on others involved in the trade.

We executed search warrants throughout the United States on a number of major bird dealers and importers from Miami, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and those are the major areas where we are seeking prosecutions. The investigation is currently now in its overt stage with the Justice Department and the Fish and Wildlife Service working together analyzing the records and documents seized, putting together the cases, grand juries are seated and we anticipate that the investigation will continue for a year to 18 months before it is finally concluded. We expect indictments in that time.

Mr. ANDERSON. Thank you.

Mr. STUDDS. The gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Hughes.

Mr. HUGHES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and welcome, Mr. Secretary. As I understand it, at the present time, we can ban the importation of an endangered species that is listed in Appendix I, but we have to rely upon a certification process for threatened species and that we can implement, basically, some of the conditions and procedures in CITES but cannot go beyond that.

Is that a fair assessment of the current law?

Mr. HAYDEN. Yes, Congressman, your observations are correct under the current law. And that is why we have a strong feeling that the law needs to be expanded, hence, the bill that we are here on today.

Mr. HUGHES. That is encouraging because I believe people agree we need to do something to deal with what is becoming a rather serious problem.

Is the certification process reliable? Can we rely upon the accuracy of the certification that it does not impact, for instance, a threatened species? Or is it subject to abuse?

Mr. HAYDEN. Unfortunately, we cannot fully rely on the certification of many of the exporting countries. Some do a relatively good job. Others have severe shortcomings in the resources necessary to do proper certification when they leave their countries. So we are not confident, Congressman, at this time, in the certification process.

Mr. HUGHES. Do we have the right under existing law to question the validity of any certifications or decisions by legal experts that a threatened species is being adversely impacted?

Mr. HAYDEN. We do not have such authority. However, in this bill it would grant us the authority. And that is one of the reasons we think that the bill is important.

We certainly believe the American consumer has the right to know whether or not he or she has purchased a wild-caught bird and whether that bird came from a sustainable population. And certainly the American consumer should have the right to refuse to purchase such birds if they had that knowledge. But, currently, we do not have such authority.

Mr. HUGHES. Let me ask you about a particular species. The African grey parrot is that in Appendix I or Appendix II?

Mr. HAYDEN. Appendix II.

Mr. HUGHES. Then it is a threatened species?

Mr. HAYDEN. It is on Appendix II of CITES and we do not have at this time adequate information as to the impact of the trade on that species.

Mr. HUGHES. That species is from Senegal?

Mr. HAYDEN. It is ironic you would ask that, Congressman, because that species is found throughout West Africa. It is not found to the best of our knowledge in Senegal, yet Senegal continues to export the species.

Mr. HUGHES. Therefore, this is an example of the difficulties we have because of the certification process for threatened species listed on Appendix II.

Mr. HAYDEN. That is correct.

Mr. HUGHES. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.

Mr. STUDDS. Mr. Secretary, again I want to thank you and commend you for your effort and that of your staff. We are getting down to the crunch time now. I hope the next week or so after the people have had a chance to digest the procedures of this hearing we can come up with a bill that is pretty much a consensus document. If we are unable to do that, it is unlikely we will be able to resolve this problem this year.

Mr. HAYDEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing and for the opportunity. And, like you, we very much want to see a consensus and I hope that common sense and the meeting of the minds will prevail where others have failed previously. We look forward to working with you to achieve that end. Mr. STUDDS. I thank you, sir.

That ends the first panel. There will be a moment of disarray now as the six members of the second panel come forward. Let me reiterate the invitation for those unable to find seats, there are a dozen or so up here.

Mr. STUDDS. All right. We will proceed in the order in which you appear on the witness list. Again, I would ask you-remind you of our request-could we have quiet, please-remind you of our request that oral statements be confined to five minutes.

We will begin with Dr. Gerard Bertrand, President of the Massachusetts Audubon Society, Inc.

STATEMENTS OF GERARD BERTRAND, PRESIDENT, MASSACHUSETTS AUDUBON SOCIETY, INC.; MARSHALL MEYERS, GENERAL COUNSEL, PET INDUSTRY JOINT ADVISORY COUNCIL; JIM LEAPE, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR U.S. AND DEVELOPED COUNTRIES, WORLD WILDLIFE FUND; STEVE BEISSINGER, AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGISTS UNION; GARY LILIENTHAL, VICE PRESIDENT/GENERAL COUNSEL, AMERICAN FEDERATION OF AVICULTURISTS; DON BRUNING, CURATOR, DEPARTMENT OF ORNITHOLOGY, NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY

STATEMENT OF GERARD BERTRAND

Mr. BERTRAND. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure to be here. Your excellent opening statement plus that of the other Members-Representatives from California and Florida, New Jersey and New York-are most appreciated. I am here today speaking on behalf of 50 conservation organizations representing many millions of members including many thousands in the most important district in Massachusetts.

It is a pleasure to be here to talk about wild birds. I have been dealing in this issue for close to 20 years. It is an issue that doesn't go away because the problem continues to get worse rather than going away. It is nice to see the United States taking a lead in this along with the EC and others. I would hate to have us be last trying to play catchup with everybody else.

In many ways, New York and New Jersey have already stolen the march on us. Many of the figures that I was going to give have already been given so I will go right to the meat of the issue. What is it we as conservationists are looking for?

First of all, we would like to see all birds included in this legislation. It doesn't make sense, given the fact there are 9,200 species of birds, to include some but not others. It creates an enormous practical difficulty for people at ports to deal with the birds coming in. Particularly since in 1989, 42 percent of all the birds that came in the United States did not have identification. And of those that were identified, who knows how many were actually identified correctly.

So from a practical standpoint, we need to include all birds. In addition, all birds are threatened by increasing human populations and by habitat destruction, the two main causes of bird loss in the world.

We support H.R. 5013 with some reservations. One of those reservations is that all birds be included.

Secondly, we encourage you to look at a complete and total ban effective immediately on signing of this legislation. This is important to us because, first of all, such a ban would save the taxpayers an enormous amount of money and would be a far more practical way to deal with things.

We recognize your suggestion of a three-tiered approach as having merit. However, we feel that a ban is the appropriate way to go and, as suggested by the gentleman from California-the gentleman from New Jersey, this is a workable way of addressing the issue. That is having a complete ban on imports to be followed by the Fish and Wildlife Service spending its time trying to determine which species can be brought in.

In fact, the conservation community has made an enormous concession here already in saying that we believe that trade can be restarted for wild-caught birds after some period of time in which the Secretary has made a determination that that trade is sustainable. That concession shouldn't go without recognition from the conservation community and I think from you, Mr. Chairman, and Members of your committee.

There are, after all, only about 200 species that make up 90 percent of the trade in wild-caught birds in the United States. Of those 200 species, the Secretary already has information on many. The International Council for Bird Preservation and other organizations can provide additional information.

Rather, Mr. Chairman, than putting the entire burden of proof on the birds and those who want to protect them, the burden of proof ought to be on the traders who want to exploit them. It is better to have a ban effective immediately that will include all birds and then let the Secretary make determinations as to which species can be sustained in trade. That is extremely important to us and a key point of our testimony.

We believe, Mr. Chairman, also, that enforcement needs to be considerably strengthened within the bill. We believe the proper model for enforcement is the excellent bill the Congress has fashioned on endangered species. The endangered species model of penalties and enforcement is the one we should pick as our model for this bill rather than significantly weaker provisions.

Third, we believe, as stated already by the Representative from New Jersey and from Florida, that there should not be a preemption provision within this bill. In fact, we need to protect those States whose citizens have chosen not to import live birds. That will also be considered again in Massachusetts and I am sure in other States.

While this bill will go far, it is only a major first step but it is not all the solution. Some States, at least for the time being, may want to have stronger laws of their own. The stronger this bill is, the more likely that all of the States will come into line and adopt their legislation to mirror the Federal bill. The weaker this bill is,