Scientists' warning on invasive alien species

By Petr Pyšek, P. Hulme, Daniel Simberloff, S. Bacher, T. Blackburn, James T. Carlton, W. Dawson, F. Essl, L. Foxcroft, P. Genovesi and 13 more. Biological Reviews of The Cambridge Philosophical Society, 2020

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Biological invasions are a global consequence of an increasingly connected world and the rise in human population size. The numbers of invasive alien species – the subset of alien species that spread widely in areas where they are not native, affecting the environment or human livelihoods – are increasing. Synergies with other global changes are exacerbating current invasions and facilitating new ones, thereby escalating the extent and impacts of invaders. Invasions have complex and often immense long‐term direct and indirect impacts. In many cases, such impacts become apparent or problematic only when invaders are well established and have large ranges. Invasive alien species break down biogeographic realms, affect native species richness and abundance, increase the risk of native species extinction, affect the genetic composition of native populations, change native animal behaviour, alter phylogenetic diversity across communities, and modify trophic networks. Many invasive alien species also change ecosystem functioning and the delivery of ecosystem services by altering nutrient and contaminant cycling, hydrology, habitat structure, and disturbance regimes. These biodiversity and ecosystem impacts are accelerating and will increase further in the future. Scientific evidence has identified policy strategies to reduce future invasions, but these strategies are often insufficiently implemented. For some nations, notably Australia and New Zealand, biosecurity has become a national priority. There have been long‐term successes, such as eradication of rats and cats on increasingly large islands and biological control of weeds across continental areas. However, in many countries, invasions receive little attention. Improved international cooperation is crucial to reduce the impacts of invasive alien species on biodiversity, ecosystem services, and human livelihoods. Countries can strengthen their biosecurity regulations to implement and enforce more effective management strategies that should also address other global changes that interact with invasions.

Subfields: Ecological Modeling, Genetics, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/03dea77148fd4428db248919209ec3166b05d3eb

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Citations in the corpus

Four priority areas to advance invasion science in the face of rapid environmental change (2020, background): “importance to ecology, conservation biology, ecosystemmanagement and restoration, and biosecurity (Ricciardi et al. 2017; Pyšek et al. 2020).”
MAcroecological Framework for Invasive Aliens (MAFIA): disentangling large-scale context dependence in biological invasions (2020, background): “…invasions Invasive alien species introduced by humans to areas beyond their native distributions (Richardson et al. 2000; Blackburn et al. 2011) are a major threat to the world’s biodiversity and economy (McGeoch et al. 2010; Blackburn et al. 2014; Brondizio et al. 2019; Pyšek et al. 2020).”
Projecting the continental accumulation of alien species through to 2050 (2020, neutral): “Besides being an outcome of globalization, biological invasions are also considered a major driver of global bio-diversity change (IPBES, 2019; Pyšek et al., 2020) and have become a defining feature of the Anthropocene (Lewis & Maslin, 2015).”
Unwelcome exchange: International trade as a direct and indirect driver of biological invasions worldwide (2021, background): “Given the robust evidence that many invasive alien species have major negative impacts on human health, food security, ecosystem services, and biodiversity, understanding the role international trade plays in biological invasions is crucial to secure sustainable economic outcomes.(10)”