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My understanding is that S. Macrophyla is on the agenda at the current CITES meeting. There was a piece on NPR (Marketplace) about it a week or more ago, with an interview with Chris Martin. The biggest flap now, though, is over pernambuco, the wood violin bows are made of.
In theory CITES applies to import and export of materials; _sales_ across borders. In practice, the enforcement is on _transport_ across borders. After all, how are you going to prove you won't sell that BRW guitar? If you do, how are they going to catch it? The authorities have to assume that any of this material that they catch at the border is going to be sold, and they can confiscate it if they want to.
The argument that 'they're too busy' to bother with me and my one little guitar is probably true. I could probably go out and stand on the highway for some time in safety, too. I've decided that I'm not going to do either.
The thing is that I'm in favor of what they're trying to do, and I've seen it coming for a long time. That's one reason I've put so much work into alternative woods and acoustics, so that, when the time came, I'd be ready to build great guitars out of the woods I can get. I will say that the current methods of enforcement are clumsy. NAMM is trying, I gather, to get a process in place where a bow, say, made of pre-CITES pernambuco, would carry a certificate that would allow the owner to carry it across any border. Rather than having the paperwork be about the act of crossing the border, and requiring a new set for avery such action, the paprerwork would apply to the piece. This would at least be much easier on traveling musicians, and guys like us who take things to shows that we don't intend to sell. There is still the problem of tracking sales, of course. However, this type of process would put the burden of proof on the government where it belongs.
There is at least one huge subtext to all of this; whether the CITES regs actually get at the real problem, or, perhaps, make it worse. It could be argued that they worked to some extent in the ivory trade, but I have my doubts as to whether the same method will work for wood. The discussion has been going on for thirty years, at least, and will no doubt continue for many years to come. At some level it doesn't matter, of course; we're stuck with the law as it is and have to live with it.
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