DAR ES SALAAM, Oct. 23 -- SENIOR officials from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are involved in a lively debate on the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

Issues regarding CITES have kept resurfacing in the meeting of officials at the levels of permanent secretaries in the fields of environment, natural resources and tourism, with some differing on some items within the Protocol.

While CITES provides legal mechanisms for the sustainable international sale of raw ivory and other valuable wildlife commodities, some of the 16 countries' representatives feel that some sections of the Protocol were incorporated contrary to the right procedures of the protocol itself, rel...