australian coral craze

[Kirk_M]

I have seen a number of online vendors promoting the sale of "Australian (insert species) coral ," often at obscene prices. I thought the export of coral from Australian waters was illegal? How do these vendors get away with selling it here, stateside, if it is a KNOWN illegal import (if indeed it is)?

THanks,

Kirk

[greenbean36191]

It's not illegal. Just like anywhere else, Australia has laws about where and what you can take from the reefs and what kind of permits that requires. Once they've been collected they fall under CITES and all the same import/export rules as corals from anywhere else.

That said, I'd be skeptical of places that claim to be selling Austrialian corals. Every few months there tends to be a trendy new collecting locality and lots of vendors suddenly get lots of corals from that area at jacked up prices. A few years ago it was Fiji, then the Soloman Islands, then Indonesia, then Japan. It seems very suspicious, and some people have even looked into the sources and found out that some were lying.

[billsreef]

It's mostly marketing, i.e. how to get insane mark ups and have customers smiling at the same time. Also I've seen the fads promote quite few "chop shops"

[scottras]

Yeah plenty of us Aussies are having a laugh at what you guys have to pay for our acans. Its good stuff sure, but not worth what some people are asking.

That being said, you guys in the US get better prices on just about anything else, so its a nice change.

[airinhere]

I think part of what makes the Ausssie corals so expensive is that Australia is a first world country. Divers there expect a decent wage to risk their health diving for corals. Elsewhere a decent wage might be considerably less to maintain a similar lifestyle. And the suppliers pass the savings on to the wholesalers, who pass the costs to the stores and then we help finance the higher costs for these Australian collected corals.

The recent influx of Australian stuff is fairly legit. And prices were definetly not like the prices from elsewhere in the pacific or Indonesia.

I also have noticed the Aussie collectors seem to have tried to gather nice pieces for export into the States and Canada. We should all hope they continue to keep their quality of coral so high in the future. I know I appreciate the amazing pieces I was lucky enough to get.

[rorchilles]

those damn 1st world countries
divers our expecting a decent wage thats ludicrous

what ever hapened to good old fashioned raping of the oceans for our benifit
those were the good old days
oh yeah thats today

[SALT WATER CRAZ]

It is suply and demand just like anything. With not many Aus. stuff coming in the US for qwite a long time it make the price go up. And there is now telling how long it will be coming in to the US. It could stop coming to the US tomarrow for all we now.

[fijiblue]

It's not illegal

Actually, yes it is very illegal! The US is not allowed to import any coral directly from Australia unless Aus. has permits to export them. Permits are issued from time to time (CITES), but are exhausted within weeks. They come in through other routes such as Aus. to other countries and then to the US - which for some reasonis legal. This is where the expense comes in from all the traveling it has to go through.

[billsreef]

fijiblue,

The same CITES permit issues affect export from Australia to any other country, not just the US

[fijiblue]

Thanks bill But you left out the part that after these CITES are exhausted, many of the corals find their way to other nearby countries with less enforcement and then into the US.

[billsreef]

Originally posted by fijiblue
Thanks bill But you left out the part that after these CITES are exhausted, many of the corals find their way to other nearby countries with less enforcement and then into the US.

Only if the Australians aren't enforcing exports as well. What your talking about is complete black market illegal exports, including from the Australian perspective That's not to say it doesn't happen, but that also means that any corals going to other countries with "less enforcement" are doing so illegally and therefore even if they eventually get routed into the US, it is still illegal.

[fijiblue]

I wouldn't exactly call it black market since it is quite the norm in the exporting world. If it was in fact illegal, then all the aussie acans coming in from Canada would be illegal and not allowed into the US.

[billsreef]

If Australian exporters have exported the entire CITES quota for the year, that's it for the year no matter what the destination. Simply put anything being exported above and beyond the CITES quota without the CITES permit is illegally exported. The Canadian thing might possibly be an end run around that being they both are an British Commonwealth. That would be a gray area and something that the various authorities involved in such trade could find interesting.

[GreshamH]

The Canadian shipments that enter the US have to have the original Aussie CITES permits in order to pass Customs/US F&WS. Of course you could smuggle them, but you can't ship them legally with out the OG CITES. Same goes for US going to Canada or elsewhere.

[Scythanith]

Originally posted by GreshamH
The Canadian shipments that enter the US have to have the original Aussie CITES permits in order to pass Customs/US F&WS. Of course you could smuggle them, but you can't ship them legally with out the OG CITES. Same goes for US going to Canada or elsewhere.

What he said! We get them directly from Aus with proper CITES documentation. And there have been several occasions where some Yank's have come up to Toronto area and bought a car load of acan's and other corals to take back and have been busted without proper permits/documentation.

Chances are the things you see coming through "black market" channels, or through other countries before they get here are likely not actually from Australia. The are something someone may be attempting to pawn off as "aussie".