Matching methods to produce maps for pest risk analysis to resources

Dominic Eyre,Richard Baker,Sarah Brunel

doi:10.3897/neobiota.18.4056

Abstract

Decision support systems (DSSs) for pest risk mapping are invaluable for guiding pest risk analysts seeking to add maps to pest risk analyses (PRAs). Maps can help identify the area of potential establishment, the area at highest risk and the endangered area for alien plant pests. However, the production of detailed pest risk maps may require considerable time and resources and it is important to match the methods employed to the priority, time and detail required. In this paper, we apply PRATIQUE DSSs to Phytophthora austrocedrae, a pathogen of the Cupressaceae, Thaumetopoea pityocampa, the pine processionary moth, Drosophila suzukii, spotted wing Drosophila, and Thaumatotibia leucotreta, the false codling moth. We demonstrate that complex pest risk maps are not always a high priority and suggest that simple methods may be used to determine the geographic variation in relative risks posed by invasive alien species within an area of concern.

Highlights

Pest risk analysis (PRA) provides the context for this paper
Since oviposition in unripe fruit allows pathogens to enter and causes a serious loss of quality, the presence of D. suzukii populations is likely to cause economic loss and the endangered area can be considered to be equivalent to the area where host crops are grown in the area of potential establishment
The risk maps used to support these PRAs were all created by using short cuts and none of them utilised all components of the PRATIQUE Decision support systems (DSSs) for climatic suitability analysis (Eyre et al 2012) and mapping areas at highest risk (Baker et al 2012) detailed investigations of the current distribution of the pest and its climate responses were generally carried out

Summary

Introduction

PRA is fundamental to plant biosecurity because it is primarily undertaken to assess the risks posed by plant pests that are not officially established in an area and to identify appropriate phytosanitary measures to prevent entry and establishment if the risk is unacceptable. Additional modules are available to help when it is important for pest risk analysts to quantify risk spatially or at least provide greater detail for particular components of the PRA. These include a decision support system (DSS) for mapping climatic suitability, summarised in Table 1 (Eyre et al 2012) and a DSS for mapping endangered areas (Baker et al 2012), the topic of this paper. Maps can be deployed to help target eradication and containment actions in the event of an outbreak and set up an effective surveillance programme

Categorise location data

Discussion

Conclusions and further work