Professors Chris Wold and Erica Lyman, through the Global Law Alliance for Animals and the Environment (GLA), L&C’s international environmental and animal law clinic, have a long history of working with the Secretariat of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS). In early June, they had the opportunity to facilitate a workshop with CMS Parties to discuss the legal contours of some of the treaty’s most important provisions.
The Convention of Migratory Species (CMS) is designed to protect migratory species as they traverse multiple political jurisdictions and hundreds, if not thousands, of miles, relying on a variety of habitats for feeding, breeding, and resting during their life cycles. For endangered migratory species, CMS prohibits the “taking, hunting, fishing capturing, harassing, deliberate killing, or attempting to engage in any such conduct.” Referred to as the “take prohibition,” CMS also allows exceptions to this prohibition. Other provisions ask the Parties to remove or minimize obstacles, such as dams, to migration. For many CMS Parties, these provisions and the exceptions have been challenging to implement in line with the treaty text.
For that reason, in 2020, the Secretariat contracted GLA to provide legal and tech nical advice on various aspects of the treaty, particularly those provisions applicable to endangered migratory species. Over the course of the last few years under Professor Lyman’s guidance, clinic students worked directly to review national legislation concerning the illegal killing and taking of migratory birds, draft model legislation to support migratory bird conservation, analyze and provide guidance on interpretation of the exceptions to the treaty’s take prohibition, and provide legal guidance on establishing and maintaining ecological connectivity for migratory wildlife.
Zachary Pavlik ’23, currently an associate attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity in their Climate Law Institute, recalls his work as a GLA student working on the CMS project as foundational for his career. Pavlik shared that “working with the Secretariat gave me an opportunity to meaningfully engage with real-life work. The skills that I was able to practice are invaluable and I often revisit lessons I learned during work with the clinic in my current job. My work with GLA gave me a head start!”
The clinic’s partnership on this project culminated with professors Wold and Lyman presenting guidance to the Parties on how best to implement the take prohibition and its exceptions, and guidance on strategies for minimizing the impacts of obstacles to migration for different species. In addition, professors Wold and Lyman facilitated discussions designed to get Parties thinking about ways to implement the conservation obligations of the treaty with respect to endangered migratory species. Approximately 50 stakeholders attended the workshop, hosted by the CMS Secretariat in Bonn, Germany, over the course of three days.
