BIO3082 Lecture Notes - Lecture 23: Propagule, Biological Pest Control, Biological Hazard
Lecture 23 – Biosecurity
What is Biosecurity?
• The protection of people, biota and the environment from infectious disease,
pests and other biological threats
• Management of risks that can have a negative impact on industries, health,
economy and environment
• What we need to Protect – potential harmful effects
o Malicious Intent – terrorist or groups who want to inflict harm on
society and introduce biohazard to a location
▪ E.g. anthrax
o Planned introductions gone wrong
▪ Deliberate release (e.g. acclimatisation societies, game,
biocontrol) escape from captivity (e.g. pet trade)
o Unintentional Introductions
▪ By-product of the movement of humans and freight/cargo
stowaways/hitchhikers
How Biosecurity Aims to Reduce the Rate and Extent of Global Environmental
Change
• Species moving around the world
o Changes number and composition of biological communities around
the world
o Establish outside of their native range
o Major driver of global environmental change
• Want to limit spread of species if most harmful
• Biosecurity aims to:
o Prevent the introduction of harmful species
▪ Harmful species need to be known
▪ Mechanism that has to be proactive rather than reactive
o Mitigate/eradicate any incursions that occur
o Develop relevant policy and legislation: needs to be strong and robust
Key Attributes of an Ideal Biosecurity Strategy
• Rates of invasive reptiles and amphibians are rapidly increasing since 1960s
• Increasing need for Biosecurity
o Globalisation
▪ Planned movement of plants and animals
▪ E.g. hitchhiker individuals in freight and cargo
▪ Unintentional ones are more important
▪ More land connections = harder for biosecurity
o Amount of cargo load are increasing – harder to control
▪ Container ships get to new locations infrequently and takes
longer – more volume to search (tradeoffs)
▪ Different environments for species to adapt to
• Cargo: long trips
• Planes: low oxygen
o Increasing propagule pressure
▪ Measure of number of things that get to a new location
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