Chartering operations

Chartering consists in an activity within the shipping industry whereby a shipowner (Party ‘C’ in the below figure) hires out the use of their vessel to a charterer (Party ‘A’ in the below figure).

Resolution Conf. 14.6 (Rev. CoP16) contains special provisions for chartering in paragraph 2 c). For Parties to make use of these provisions:

a) the chartering operation has to be under a written arrangement between the State where the vessel is registered and the chartering State, consistent with the framework on chartering operations of a relevant Regional Fisheries Management Organization/Arrangement (RFMO/A); and

b) the CITES Secretariat has to be informed of this arrangement in advance of its entry into effect and the Secretariat has to make this arrangement available to all Parties and to any relevant RFMO/A.

If these requirements are met, Parties may apply the one-state transaction provisions (“Introduction from the Sea”) to a vessel registered in one State (Party ‘A’ in the below figure) and chartered by another State (Party ‘C’ in the below figure) when conducting introduction from the sea of CITES listed specimen into the chartering State. For introduction from the sea by that same vessel (Party ‘A’ in the below figure) into its flag state (‘A’) or into a third state (‘B’), the import/export provisions should be applied.