Invasion of Foreign Species

The invasion of foreign species

When China opened its door to global commerce decades ago, it also opened itself to the incursion of alien species, which are finding local prey in the form of plants, aquatic species, animals or microbes.

Compared with geographic border control, the defense line against alien species is porous. Species that are foreign to this country are brought in on cargo containers, by travelers and with all kinds of imported agricultural products.

An alarming message was sent out from the recent International Congress on Biological Invasion that the intrusion of foreign species has had a serious impact in China.

But the danger has not received the same attention as other non-traditional security threats such as economic and social issues.

In the academic world, there is still debate going on as to whether or not there is a crisis of foreign species invading China. Some hold that nature has enough power to maintain a biological balance.

After all, carrots, corn, peanuts and potatoes, all imported species from foreign countries, have become staple foods in China.

And for many ordinary people, a threat by alien bugs, ants and shrubs seems hard to detect.

More scientific approaches are still needed to discern and assess the risk of different foreign species coming into China. However, it is clear that the explosive growth of global trade and human migration have significantly increased the invasion of alien species, posing potential danger to local biological balance and diversity. And while in the past most imported plant species into China were from Eurasia, now alien species come from all over the world.

It is a fact that harmful alien species already cost China direct economic losses of at least 50 billion yuan ($7.3 billion) every year.

Similarly, species originating from Asia are exported to Europe and the US, causing possible danger to local ecosystems in those areas as well.

But countries with large numbers of immigrants, such as the US and Australia, are better prepared to guard themselves against invasive species through detailed laws and regulations.

The public in those countries is also well informed about foreign species, their impact and control and management measures. Students of a middle school in California, for example, have been clearing weeds from a local recreational area for over a decade, part of the effort to remove foreign plant species and return the area to native ecological conditions.

A response system and public awareness are just starting in China. So far, it is a war without smoke, but it deserves the attention of every one.