Towards a global database of weed risk assessments: a test of transferability for the tropics

Abstract

Worldwide spread and establishment of alien plant species continues to accelerate and damage ecological and agricultural systems. Early warning and prevention of high-risk introductions is the most costeffective approach to minimise losses while maximising benefits, and the Australian Weed Risk Assessment (A-WRA) system has been the most well-developed and successful predictive scheme. However, any system would be limited if the results or scores were confined to the locality of assessment. We compiled A-WRA scores conducted in four tropical to sub-tropical regions and tested the accuracy of these scores for predicting naturalisations for a separate well-documented, equatorial, exotic flora where weed risk assessments have never been conducted. Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves reflect high accuracies of predictions, comparable to those in other studies. No significant differences in accuracy were found between each regional subset and the compiled set of scores. Our results show that A-WRA scores assessed at one locality can be used for others of similar climate, increasing the utility of every species' assessment. A global database of A-WRA scores would enable rapid local decision-making in border controls on imported plant species. A growing record of species assessments would also facilitate monitoring evolutionary and ecological aspects of invasive species.

Assessing the Invasion Risk ofEucalyptusin the United States Using the Australian Weed Risk Assessment

“…The differences in WRA outcomes between our work and earlier assessments (Table 1) contrast with reports of the generality of WRA predictions across geographies with similar climates [39]. Although we sought to conservatively interpret the literature and answered questions only when we found specific evidence, our scores are consistently higher than those from other efforts.…”

Global approaches to addressing biofuel‐related invasive species risks and incorporation into U.S. laws and policies

“…The studies incorporated into Fig. 1 cover a variety of geographic regions, including the United States as a whole, Hawaii and the Pacific Islands, Florida, Italy, and Japan, as previous studies have suggested that Australian WRA evaluations are accurate among regions with similar climates (Gordon et al 2008a, Chong et al 2011.…”

“…Davis et al (2010) suggest that secondary screening may be important for species qualifying for accept, as well as evaluate further, in order to reduce the potential for accepting a highly invasive species; their proposed follow-up screens include postintroduction quarantine cultivation trials and monitoring. Two different metastudies have found that the Australian WRA is an effective screening tool across geographic regions (with adaptations for climate matching and the other geography-specific questions highlighted above) and suggest that Australian WRA species evaluations from one location can be used with reasonable confidence for other areas with similar climate (Gordon et al 2008a, Chong et al 2011), although the cross-regional correlation is more accurate for major invaders than minor (Gordon et al 2008a).…”

Predicting Invasion Probability from Botanic Gardens using Exotic Species Traits

“…There are many risk assessment frameworks (e.g. WRA) that were suggested as reliable systems for global application (Chong et al, 2011). However, most of these assessment frameworks were need specific data, either traits data or other supporting information.…”