At the latest annual meeting of the CITES Animal Committee, it was recommended the Solomon Islands' government reduce their annual bottlenose dolphin capture/export quota from 100 to 10 for up to four years as a precautionary standard until population surveys are completed.

This latest recommendation was made following previous calls for CITES to take action against the current Solomon Islands Government who overturned a ban put in place by the previous government on captures for export which allowed wild caught dolphins to be sent to the Atlantis Palm Resort in Dubai.

The Marine Connection and other colleagues around the world have condemned this trade and conclude that due to ineffectual reports, it is impossible to determine that the export of bottlenose dolphins is not detrimental to the wild population - a CITES requirement; and we believe that future captures would seriously jeoparidise the wild dolphin population around these islands.

Disappointingly however, it was decided that before any export quota could be reduced a further review would have to be undertaken. Whilst this is of course a welcome move, we sincerely believe that action to stop the amount of dolphin captures and exports has to be taken as a matter of urgency and the Marine Connection are supporting the call for a halt to any captures/exports until this review is completed.