Pest risk analysis for alien plants—the new concept of the European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organisation

Pest risk analysis for alien plants—the new concept of the European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organisation | Risikoanalyse von gebietsfremden Pflanzen—Das neue Konzept der EPPO

2004

The European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organisation (EPPO) aims to prevent the entry and spread of organisms harmful to both cultivated and wild plants. Basing their activities on those of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the International Plant Protection Convention, the EPPO is developing a new concept for invasive alien species and ‘plants as pests’. A pest risk analysis is necessary in most cases to identify which organisms should be regulated and how. In accordance with the International Plant Protection Convention, an EPPO risk assessment standard exists for this purpose which has now been revised to be applicable also to potentially invasive alien plants and assess the effects they pose to the uncultivated environment. In 2003, the EPPO sent a questionnaire to its 44 member states asking for plants which have been intentionally or unintentionally introduced and are considered invasive. The member countries reported hundreds of species, of which 42 were selected for further assessment. This may result in recommendations for regulations and measures against the introduction and spread of all or some of these plants.

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