What Can Decision Analysis Do for Invasive Species Management?

Abstract

Decisions about management of invasive species are difficult for all the reasons typically addressed by multiattribute decision analysis: uncertain outcomes, multiple and conflicting objectives, and many interested parties with differing views on both facts and values. This article illustrates how the tools of multiattribute analysis can improve management of invasive species, with an emphasis on making explicit the social values and preferences that must inform invasive species management. Risk assessment protocols developed previously for invasive species management typically suffer from two interacting flaws: (1) separating risk assessment from risk management, thus disrupting essential connections between the social values at stake in invasive species decisions and the scientific knowledge necessary to predict the likely impacts of management actions, and (2) relying on expert judgment about risk framed in qualitative and value-laden terms, inadvertently mixing the expert's judgment about what is likely to happen with personal preferences. Using the values structuring and probability-modeling elements of formal decision analysis can remedy these difficulties and make invasive species management responsive to both good science and public values. The management of feral pigs in Hawaiian ecosystems illustrates the need for such an integrated approach.

Biological invasions and biocultural diversity: linking ecological and cultural systems

“…Yet the pigs' destruction of fragile native ecosystems containing food and medicinal plants threaten other elements of native Hawaiian culture (Maguire 2004). The Polynesian rat, considered a key component of tribal identity for the Ngati Wai Maori in New Zealand, threatens endangered species and in certain instances has brought the New Zealand Department of Conservation in conflict with the tribes, an echo of similar conflicts over feral pigs within Hawaii (Russell 2004;Towns et al 2006).…”

Economics of invasive species policy and management

“…Horan et al (2002) use surprise functions that include measures of how surprised the decision-maker would be to experience a particular outcome given selected management choices. Multiattribute decision analysis also has been proposed for determining acceptable invasion management strategies given the uncertain outcomes of invasion management, the prevalence of multiple and conflicting objectives, and the many stakeholders with Economics of invasive species… 3347 differing values and views on the functioning of the system (Maguire 2004). Such structured decisionmaking provides a systematic means for eliciting objectives, values, and system understanding, but ultimately could use one of the many approaches described here to identify potential solutions for a particular decision context.…”

Scientific and Normative Foundations for the Valuation of Alien-Species Impacts: Thirteen Core Principles

“…This can be best achieved in a structured decisionmaking and conflict-solution process (Gregory et al 2012, Redpath et al 2015. Several techniques have been developed and tested for solving conflicts in conservation (e.g., multicriteria analyses, consultation and consensus processes, and voting systems), each of which may be appropriate in some situations but inappropriate in others (e.g., Maguire 2004, García-Llorente et al 2008, Monterroso et al 2011, Gregory et al 2012, Redpath et al 2015. In addition, risk assessments, cost-benefit analyses, multicriteria frameworks, and sensitivity analyses may support the decisionmaking process by providing information on risks and uncertainties associated with the outcomes of different decisions (e.g., Liu et al 2011).…”

“…The valuation of any given change attributed (directly or indirectly) to an alien species depends on a range of parameters. Key factors are the environmental and socioeconomic contexts, personal value systems of the assessor, vested economic interests, risk perception, and available alternative opportunities (Maguire 2004). Different stakeholders perceive such impacts differently; this means that an invasion of an alien species can be viewed as detrimental (often therefore termed "invasive" sensu CBD 2002), neutral, beneficial, or simply irrelevant (Estévez et al 2015).…”