A Coordinated, Risk-Based, National Forest Biosecurity Surveillance Program for Australian Forests

Abstract

Australia has a comprehensive plant biosecurity system, with the Australian Government responsible for pre-border (e.g., off-shore compliance) and border (e.g., import inspections) activities, while state governments undertake a variety of post-border activities (e.g., post-border surveillance, management of pest incursions, and regulation of pests) designed to reduce alien pest and pathogen arrival and establishment. Once an alien pest or pathogen has established and spread, its management becomes the responsibility of the land manager. There has been a growing understanding among plant industries of the need to be more engaged in post-border biosecurity activities, including resourcing and undertaking early detection surveillance and contingency planning. Here we summarize Australia’s broader plant biosecurity system along with current forest-specific biosecurity surveillance activities. We describe the development of a proposed forest biosecurity partnership between the Australian Government, state governments and the forest sector to establish a post-border, risk-based National Forest Pest Surveillance Program. We outline why there is a recognized need for such a program, how it would improve biosecurity outcomes in relation to forests, its component activities, and key stakeholders and beneficiaries.

Characterising Biosecurity Initiatives Globally to Support the Development of a Progressive Management Pathway for Terrestrial Animals: A Scoping Review

“…FAO and World Health Organization (WHO) guidance states that without prerequisites, a risk-based system such as HACCP will fail [ 80 ]. A related problem of too advanced control approaches is also that they often involve an unaffordable start-up cost [ 81 ] or ignore the needs of stakeholders at the community and local levels, whose engagement is a crucial ingredient to ensure better assessment and management of animal, plant, and environment health [ 82 ]. The stakeholder engagement should also take into account the underlying business models, as research shows that private actors are more likely to comply with biosecurity if they see their economic viability [ 6 , 83 ].…”

High throughput screening of fungal phytopathogens caught in Australian forestry insect surveillance traps

“…During post-border surveillance activities performed in the summer of 2020-2021, state agencies across Australia submitted insect panel-trap catches from 45 different locations (Figure 1 and Table 1). Trap catches were predominantly shared from within existing surveillance frameworks, including high risk site surveillance around ports-of-entry and in Pinus plantations where forest health surveillance activities are routinely conducted (Carnegie et al, 2018(Carnegie et al, , 2022. Intercept panel traps (Alpha Scents, Inc, OR, USA and ChemTica Internacional, Heredia, Costa Rica) contained semiochemical lures designed to attract beetles of the Cerambycidae and Curculionidae families (Table 1), with insects collected into a preservative drowning fluid (Table 1) within collection cups attached at the bottom of each trap.…”

“…As a result, forest biosecurity systems have been brought under review to address the needs for better harmonization, international collaboration, and continued investment to ensure better preparedness in the face of these invasive threats (Bonello et al, 2022). In Australia, a National Forest Pest Surveillance Program (NFPSP) has recently been established to fill gaps in post-border surveillance activities specific to the forest industry (Carnegie et al, 2022).…”

“…While effective, detections made through passive surveillance methods have a lower probability for successful eradication because the incursions will have likely extended beyond the initial phases of establishment by the time it is reported (Wilson et al, 2004;Carnegie and Nahrung, 2019;Paap et al, 2022). The NFPSP aims to increase the chance of early detection and eradication with a newly proposed framework encouraging better coordination across surveillance activities and risk-based analysis targeting entry pathways (Carnegie et al, 2022). Ideally, this will aim at detecting forestry's high priority pests (Plant Health Australia [PHA], 2022b) at high-risk sites through tree health assessment and/or insect trapping.…”

“…Consequently, Australian forest biosecurity routinely targets bark and ambrosia beetles through insect trapping using semiochemical lures (Bashford, 2008), monitoring the already established pests in plantation forests [e.g., Ips grandicollis (Eichhoff) which vectors the blue stain fungus Ophiostoma ips (Rumbold)] and screening for potential exotics at high-risk sites (e.g., Ips and Dendroctonus spp. ; Plant Health Australia [PHA], 2022b) (Carnegie et al, 2018(Carnegie et al, , 2022. At present, diagnosis of trap catches during forest biosecurity surveillance is only conducted on insects, leaving an opportunity for Australian biosecurity agencies to improve their capacity by incorporating methods that can simultaneously screen for phytopathogens within the same traps.…”