Manageability assessment for invasive alien species of Union concern in Belgium

Manageability assessment for invasive alien species of Union concern in Belgium presents the raw scores from the assessment of the management feasibility of Union list species performed in Belgium, and published by the Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO). This expert-driven exercise supports the implementation of the EU Regulation on the prevention of introduction and spread of invasive alien species (EU 1143/2014) in Belgium. In particular, it supports the identification of cost-effective management objectives as laid out by Article 17 and Article 19 on IAS eradication and management respectively. It follows the UK Non-Native Risk Management scheme (NNRM) developed by Booy et al. (2017) and adapted for Belgium by Adriaens et al. (2019). A diverse group of experts with experience in management and invasions were asked to assess the set of criteria related to the feasibility of management using the semi-quantitative scoring scheme. Importantly, assessors were provided with a specific invasion scenario and a clearly predefined management strategy to score. The invasion scenatio presents the current distribution and current management in Belgium. For species that are not present in the territory, the invasion scenario is an imaginary but theoretically realistic scenario taking into account pathways, entry points, habitat and detection threshold of the species. For the scenario, please refer to the reports. The manageability exercise provides an evidence base for decision on management of these regulated invasive alien species in Belgium through a transparent, standardized and repeatable process.

Dataset description

The dataset manageabilityResultsBelgium.csv contains the following fields

• species: Scientific name of the species of Union concern.
• environment: Main environment of the species, either terrestrial, freshwater or marine.
• assessorID: Anonymized unique reference to the expert who performed the assessment, e.g. assessor01, assessor02.
• managementStrategy: The management strategy considered for the risk management assessment, either eradication or spread limitation. 
• spreadLimitationOption: The chosen option for spread limitation, based on the species distribution extent (see Adriaens et al. 2019):
  • option 1: limiting species presence to a single or a few patches
  • option 2: containment of populations in core area(s)
  • option 3: elimination of the most dispersive populations
  • option 4: maintenance of pest free areas. 
• criterium: The risk management criterium considered (effectiveness, practicality, cost, (non-target) impact, acceptability, window of opportunity and likelihood of reintroduction).
• score: The numeric score for the assessed criterium, on a 5 point scale from 1-5. In all cases 1 is the least and 5 the most feasible. For example, a very effective eradication strategy scores 5, a very ineffective strategy scores 1, whereas a very inexpensive strategy scores 5, a very expensive one scores 1. 
• confidence: Confidence rating provided by the expert for every score. Confidence is recorded on a 3 point scale: low, medium, high.
• assessmentYear: Year of the manageability assessment, either 2018 or 2023.
• remarks: A textual field with some remarks on the assessment.

Acknowledgements

We thank all of the assessors who willingly provided their assessments on the feasibility of management for the Union List species in Belgium. Their names can be found in the published reports that are supplemented by this dataset.