Exotic leather products made from special species such as alligator, caiman, crocodile, python, lizard, and shark. Applies to all reptiles. These, among others, require a CITES certificate to be legally imported into Norway. You must have an import license for legal importation.

CITES stands for "Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of wild fauna and flora" - Endangered Species Act of 1973, which most countries in the world follow. In Norway, the Norwegian Environment Agency based in Trondheim is the experts in the field, see the list at http://www.miljødirektoratet.no/cites/. Bredal & Partnere currently only import exotic leather goods from the USA. Many leather goods are transfer items from other countries, but all products are checked by the US Fish and Wildlife Service in Washington.

They have their local representatives who visit the factories and tape and hand over the packages directly to UPS Global service for shipment to Norway.

The USA has the absolute best practices in the world in this area and is a role model for how to enforce rules and protect vulnerable animal species. For example, American alligators were protected for 20 years while building a natural and conscious model for the species' distribution and maintenance. Today, there are more than 1 million wild alligators in Louisiana and over 1 million wild alligators in Florida. At the same time, there are over 300,000 alligators distributed among more than 50 farms. 10% of all farmed alligators are released every other year. The skin mainly goes to Asia and some to France, Italy, and Russia. The meat is healthy and tastes properly prepared like a mix of chicken and shrimp. This is also a major industry. There is no CITES on ostrich, bison, and stingray.

Watch the Louisiana Alligator Advisory Council's video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3hGwQuGypk