LeftyBassist.com

Update from Mike Robinson at Eastwood Guitars:

As we all know, rosewood is commonly used in many electric and acoustic guitars. But from January 2, 2017, trade of any instrument containing any amount of Rosewood (including East Indian rosewood, Honduran rosewood and Kosso - known as African Rosewood) besides cocobolo and African blackwood. In total, 300 different species of rosewood will now be protected, under the new trade restrictions.

WHAT IS CITES?

CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) is an international agreement between governments. Its aim is to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival.

A CITES summit took place last September, in Johannesburg, South Africa, when Governments decided to crackdown on illegal trading of Rosewood.

HOW WILL CITES AFFECT YOU AS A GUITARIST?

In short - the sale of any guitar which uses rosewood will be affected one way or the other, because of the new regulation - but only if the guitar is being sold to a different country than your own. Over 100 nations are subjected to this new ruling.
All sellers must apply for a CITES certificate, proving source of rosewood is legal, if shipping a guitar to a different country.

Ebay and Reverb sellers will be subjected to regulation, too.
Prices might go up as manufacturers and dealers will seek to offset the extra fees they'll have to pay.

Rosewood fingerboards can become less popular, as manufacturers might move to different types of wood to avoid the extra bureaucracy.

Do you want to know more? Subscribe to our CITES updates mailing list and make sure you'll get any more news as they become available, and get our FREE CITES GUIDE in pdf format when you confirm your subscription!

Looks like we are going to see a lot of Maple necks and hopefully some lefty Fenders with maple necks.

Additional CITES information from an international retailer's perspective- not good news:

https://blog.andertons.co.uk/guitars/cites

Ah man.....

I know this doesn't affect you guys living in the good ol' U.S. of A. quite as much. (Because of the vast quantity of lefty stuff already in that market and the larger number of people to sell/trade with.) But damn. For a Canadian it really affects the used/vintage market. Not only will no-one sell me a bass with rosewood on it from anywhere else in the world, I can't sell any of my basses - should I choose to do so - to anywhere else in the world. The market for lefty instruments is bad everywhere but in a country one tenth the size of the US, it's really tight.

I literally own one bass out of eight that doesn't have a rosewood board. (My '77 Kramer with an alu neck and ebanol board.)

Well. On the plus side, I have a legitimate excuse to tell my wife why I'm not selling any of my basses I don't use........

Now they're gonna start using some other dark wood instead of rosewood on new instruments I bet.

I guess the MIJ market on Ebay is about to dry up :/

For lefties, who rely so much on the internet, it could be difficult times ahead. The last two basses I bought (Jaguar & Bachbird) were both via international internet sellers. They simply weren't available through domestic channels in the US and never were.

And yeah, I feel particularly bad for those of us on the board like Jay who live in countries with a much smaller population for the reasons he explained.

Gibson ended up baking their maple boards to replicate the look of rosewood a couple of years ago.

Frenchy might be right. If there's one positive to take out of this it might be that Fender has to start offering maple lefties again.

In other words, this whole mess really sucks! There should be some sort of provision for companies that already own rosewood, and can prove it was purchased on or before a certain date, and for that reason are able to use it, and ship it on a completed project. I wonder how many of the people who sit on the CITES board are musicians, artists, or wood-based builders, who understand what the impact this new regulation will have on people who rely upon this beautiful wood to earn a living from....

I had USACG create a neck for me using Pau Ferro and I absolutely love it.
It's bright, like maple, and has a gorgeous grain.I don't think I saw that wood on the list.

pete

And this will murder anything MIM as well. Crazy.

Pau Ferro has been my preferred fretboard wood for over a decade, and is not on the CITES list. I anticipate you'll be seeing even more of it, and also Katalox, as the regulations get sorted out and put into enforcement.

As of Jan '17, I have stopped offering Rosewood, Mahogany, and Bubinga as a choice for new bass construction.

Has anyone tried to import an instrument with Rosewood since this has gone into effect?

You read my mind. Wondering myself.

Upfront Guitars said they've been shipping out with no problem.

Damn. I don't know what to do; risk having the guy ship from Costa Rica because it's a very good deal, buy something within the US but may either not be nearly as good for the money or pay way more to get an equivalent.

I guess the worst part is that I don't really know first-hand the quality of any of them. Or, maybe that is a blessing; whatever I end up with, I won't know what I am missing with the others.