Abstract
The legacy of deliberate and accidental introductions of invasive alien species to Australia has had a hefty economic toll, yet quantifying the magnitude of the costs associated with direct loss and damage, as well as for management interventions, remains elusive. This is because the reliability of cost estimates and under-sampling have not been determined. We provide the first detailed analysis of the reported costs associated with invasive species to the Australian economy since the 1960s, based on the recently published InvaCost database and supplementary information, for a total of 2078 unique cost entries. Since the 1960s, Australia has spent or incurred losses totalling at least US$298.58 billion (2017 value) or AU$389.59 billion (2017 average exchange rate) from invasive species. However, this is an underestimate given that costs rise as the number of estimates increases following a power law. There was an average 1.8–6.3-fold increase in the total costs per decade since the 1970s to the present, producing estimated costs of US$6.09–57.91 billion year-1 (all costs combined) or US$225.31 million–6.84 billion year-1 (observed, highly reliable costs only). Costs arising from plant species were the highest among kingdoms (US$151.68 billion), although most of the costs were not attributable to single species. Of the identified weedy species, the costliest were annual ryegrass (Lolium rigidum), parthenium (Parthenium hysterophorus) and ragwort (Senecio jacobaea). The four costliest classes were mammals (US$48.63 billion), insects (US$11.95 billion), eudicots (US$4.10 billion) and monocots (US$1.92 billion). The three costliest species were all animals – cats (Felis catus), rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus) and red imported fire ants (Solenopsis invicta). Each State/Territory had a different suite of major costs by species, but with most (3–62%) costs derived from one to three species per political unit. Most (61%) of the reported costs applied to multiple environments and 73% of the total pertained to direct damage or loss compared to management costs only, with both of these findings reflecting the availability of data. Rising incursions of invasive species will continue to have substantial costs for the Australian economy, but with better investment, standardised assessments and reporting and coordinated interventions (including eradications), some of these costs could be substantially reduced.
Highlights
Biological invasions continue to erode economies, ecosystems and societies worldwide, with no sign of abatement (Simberloff et al 2013; Bradshaw et al 2016; Pyšek et al 2020)
We focus on Australia and its territories to provide the first detailed assessment of the reported economic costs of invasive species since the 1960s, based on records extracted from the recently published InvaCost database (Diagne et al 2020b), combined with both an independent database of costs restricted to invasive herbivore species and recent data describing the costs of invasive plants and other disease-causing agents
To determine the cost of invasive species to the Australian economy, we used cost data collected in the InvaCost database (Diagne et al 2020a, b) (n = 2,419 entries) concerning the global costs of invasive species, based on published literature, enabling comprehensive quantification of costs associated with invasive species at various spatio-temporal scales
Summary
Biological invasions continue to erode economies, ecosystems and societies worldwide, with no sign of abatement (Simberloff et al 2013; Bradshaw et al 2016; Pyšek et al 2020). A lack of resolute, comprehensive and synthesised economic cost estimates precludes adequate comparisons and compilation at, for example, the national level. Such information can help to assist in setting priorities by policy-makers and organisations for managing invasive species in some of the most impacted countries. The InvaCost database was developed to provide the most comprehensive and standardised compilation of invasion costs globally (Diagne et al 2020b) This advance addresses the aforementioned limitations by presenting economic costs at a global scale, yet with sufficient resolution to enable assessment in more granular national, taxonomic and socioeconomic contexts. While broad-scale perspectives of the economic costs of invasive species are needed because of the transboundary nature of invasions, national or regional assessments are still required in much greater detail (Diagne et al 2020a)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
