Downscaling Pest Risk Analyses: Identifying Current and Future Potentially Suitable Habitats for Parthenium hysterophorus with Particular Reference to Europe and North Africa

• Published in: PloS one 2015-09, Vol.10 (9), p.e0132807-e0132807
• Main Authors: Kriticos, Darren J, Brunel, Sarah, Ota, Noboru, Fried, Guillaume, Oude Lansink, Alfons G J M, Panetta, F Dane, Prasad, T V Ramachandra, Shabbir, Asad, Yaacoby, Tuvia
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Africa, Northern; Agrarische bedrijfseconomie; Assessments; Asteraceae; Asteraceae - physiology; Bedrijfseconomie; Biogeochemistry; Business Economics; Cheese; Climate Change; Climate effects; Climate models; Crops; Dairy products; Ecosystem; Environmental aspects; Environmental risk; Equatorial regions; Europe; Global temperature changes; Guayule; Habitats; Identification methods; Influence; Introduced Species; Irrigation; Irrigation effects; Land use; Minimum temperatures; Models, Theoretical; Niches; Nonnative species; Northern Hemisphere; Parthenium; Parthenium hysterophorus; Pests; Plant protection; Protection and preservation; Risk Assessment; Scaling; Seeds; Spatial distribution; Studies; WASS
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0132807

Pest Risk Assessments (PRAs) routinely employ climatic niche models to identify endangered areas. Typically, these models consider only climatic factors, ignoring the 'Swiss Cheese' nature of species ranges due to the interplay of climatic and habitat factors. As part of a PRA conducted for the European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organization, we developed a climatic niche model for Parthenium hysterophorus, explicitly including the effects of irrigation where it was known to be practiced. We then downscaled the climatic risk model using two different methods to identify the suitable habitat types: expert opinion (following the EPPO PRA guidelines) and inferred from the global spatial distribution. The PRA revealed a substantial risk to the EPPO region and Central and Western Africa, highlighting the desirability of avoiding an invasion by P. hysterophorus. We also consider the effects of climate change on the modelled risks. The climate change scenario indicated the risk of substantial further spread of P. hysterophorus in temperate northern hemisphere regions (North America, Europe and the northern Middle East), and also high elevation equatorial regions (Western Brazil, Central Africa, and South East Asia) if minimum temperatures increase substantially. Downscaling the climate model using habitat factors resulted in substantial (approximately 22-53%) reductions in the areas estimated to be endangered. Applying expert assessments as to suitable habitat classes resulted in the greatest reduction in the estimated endangered area, whereas inferring suitable habitats factors from distribution data identified more land use classes and a larger endangered area. Despite some scaling issues with using a globally conformal Land Use Systems dataset, the inferential downscaling method shows promise as a routine addition to the PRA toolkit, as either a direct model component, or simply as a means of better informing an expert assessment of the suitable habitat types.