Enacted by United States Congress to implement the Convention on Internations Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the Species Conservation Act of 1966 prohibits unlicensed import and export of animal and plants listed by the United States Secretary of the Interior as threatened with extinction.
As of 1997, 608 taxa were covered by the act. The Species Conservation Act of 1966 was one of the first modern statutes addressing the problem of species decline and extinction.