Why is there such low awareness of the risks posed by the trade in plants?

Risk, flora and fauna: past, present and future Long-distance movement of plant commodities (e.g. plants for planting and firewood) poses a serious risk to plant and forest health worldwide due to the associated transfer of... [ view full abstract ]

Risk, flora and fauna: past, present and future
Long-distance movement of plant commodities (e.g. plants for planting and firewood) poses a serious risk to plant and forest health worldwide due to the associated transfer of plant pests and pathogens. Phytosanitary risks are worsened by asymptomatic hosts and by rapidly increasing amounts of traded material, thus making inspection and interception often ineffective. However, there is a lower stakeholder awareness of the risks posed by international and regional plant trade compared to animal movements. For example, detailed data on livestock transport events are recorded in most developed countries, thus enabling network epidemiology studies, in turn facilitating risk management, whereas data are still rare about the connectivity of plant traders. It is often argued that dearth of plant trade data results from commercial sensitivity, but such argument should also apply to animal trade. Heightened awareness of the risks posed by the trade in livestock and pets is a likely consequence of the many diseases of animals that can also become a nuisance for people. There are instead only a few cases of plant pathogens also causing disease in human beings. This asymmetry in risk perception and allocated resources due to lack of social amplification, may have facilitated a series of recent plant health emergencies (e.g. due to Phytophthora ramorum and Xylella fastidiosa) for which we might have been better prepared if plant health had received the same media, public and research attention that it suddenly got in 2012 with the first report of ash dieback in the UK. Moreover, as with greenhouse gas emissions and climate change, a tragedy of the commons applies to plant health too, inasmuch as risky behaviour (e.g. purchasing plants from far away or not complying with phytosanitary regulation) leads to externalized risks, e.g. when diseases of ornamental plants then jump to the semi-natural environment. But this argument has only limited value as it applies to many animal health issues too. The talk will provide some background about the relationships between trade, biosecurity and the risks of biological invasions, thereby introducing the role of the EFSA Plant Health Panel in assessing the risks to plant health in the European Union. The question posed in the title of the talk will then be addressed with case studies of interdisciplinary research at the interface between risk analysis, network theory, bibliometrics and plant pathology.