Yep, it's true. Fiji is now stopping all outside shipments of non-cultured liverock until CITIES decides how they should deal with it. It seems as the 7th of November, FIJI has been odered to stop shipping all non-cultered live rock until all paper work has been complete. Right now, the Fijian government has filed the paper work but CITIES has still not lifted the ban.
From http://www.liveaquaria.com/general/general.cfm?general_pagesid=225The U.S. has banned the import of corals and live rock from Fiji because of their noncompliance with the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITIES). This import ban was not, however, instituted because of environmental problems resulting from the collection of corals and live rock within Fiji's numerous reefs.
CITIES is a regulatory agency that helps countries determine the number of organisms that can be safely harvested from an ecosystem. Due to limited resources, Fiji has not been able to perform the steps required by CITIES.
This ban affects all hard corals and live rock, which is classified as Scleractinia, and considered a hard coral. While soft corals alone are not protected, they are typically collected with a small piece of live rock.
The Fijian government has not released a timeline detailing their CITIES compliance plans. We will post information on their compliance as we receive it. In the meantime, we are making every effort to replenish our stock from alternate collection sites within the Indo and South Pacific.
