Invasive Alien Species Working Group
Financing and liability
The following text is the result of the collective effort of the members of the Invasive Alien Species Working Groups. As there was no volunteer task leader, the European Commission processed the inputs and feedback received from the participants. The Commission acted here merely as an editorand thecontent of this paper should not be taken in any way to indicate the official position of the European Commission.This paper is intended purely to collect expert input and stakeholders' views on possible policy options.
This text is meant to provide input to the European Commission policy-making process and it should provide a fair representation of different policy options available, with an analysis of the advantages or drawbacks of the different approaches. The exercise was not meant to come to a systematic consensus as to the preferred options, but rather to provide an overview of the different options and tools available. The present text has undergone different rounds of consultations with the members of the Working Group and it should reflect the different – maybe contradicting – opinions and positions of all its members.
By approving this text the members of the working group recognise the text as a fair representation of all views expressed during the debate but not necessarily endorsing all conclusions or recommendations.
List of members WG1
Member StatesFrank / Barsch / Ministry of Environment, Germany
Zoltán / Botta-Dukát / Institute of Ecology and Botany of Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary
Sandra / Cellina / Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures - Département de l'environnement, Luxembourg
Claire / Collin / Federal Public Service Health, Food Chain Security and Environment - DG Environment, Belgium
Ema / Gojdičová / State Nature Conservancy of SR, Regional Office, Slovakia
Melanie / Josefsson / Environmental Protection Agency, Sweden
Wiebe / Lammers / Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (Invasive Alien Species Team), Netherlands
Gerry / Leckey / Species Protection Unit -Science and BiodiversitySectionNational Parks & Wildlife Service - Department of Environment Heritage and Local Government, Ireland
Merike / Linnamägi / Ministry of Environment, Estonia
Hélène / Menigaux / Ministry of Ecology, Energy, Sustainable Development and the Sea, France
Johanna / Niemivuo-Lahti / Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, Finland
Niall / Moore / GB Non-native Species Secretariat, UK
Branka / Tavzes / Ministry of the Environment and Spatial Planning, Slovenia
Organisations
Robert / Ashdown / European Cruise Council
Dominique / Benzaken / IUCN
Arianna / Broggiato / European Bureau for Conservation and Development - EBCD
Sarah / Brunel / European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organization
Marie-Alice / Budniok / European Landowners' Organization – ELO asbl
Kristijan / Civic / ECNC - European Centre for Nature Conservation
Jim / Collins / Sustainable Users Network
Deborah / Long / Plantlife / Planta Europa
Staci / McLennan / Eurogroup for Animals/Eurogroup for Wildlife and Laboratory Animals - EWLA
Yves / Lecocq / Federation of Associations for Hunting and Conservation
Alex / Ploeg / Ornamental Fish International - OFI
Tania / Runge / Copa-Cogeca
Lieselot / van der Veken / IBMA
Paul / Walton / BirdLife International
Experts
Etienne / Branquart / Belgian Biodiversity Platform
Giuseppe / Brundu / SardinianForest Service (CFVA)
Dan / Cogalniceanu / University Ovidius Constanta, Romania
Franz / Essl / Austrian Environment Agency
Marc / Kenis / CABI Europe-Switzerland
Christian / Ries / Musée d'histoire naturelle, Luxembourg
Barbara / Tokarska-Guzik / University of Silesia, Faculty of Biology and Environmental Protection, Poland
Teodora / Trichkova / Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research, Bulgaria
Ahmet / Uludag / European Environment Agency
Jochen / Vandekerkhove / European Commission - Joint Research Centre
Marcus / Zisenis / European Topic Centre on Biological Diversity
List of members WG2
Member StatesOlivér / Váczi / Ministry for Rural Development, Hungary
Sandra / Cellina / Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures - Département de l'environnement, Luxembourg
Ema / Gojdičová / State Nature Conservancy of SR, Regional Office, Slovakia
Melanie / Josefsson / Environmental Protection Agency, Sweden
Wiebe / Lammers / Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (Invasive Alien Species Team), Netherlands
Merike / Linnamägi / Ministry of Environment, Estonia
Hélène / Menigaux / Ministry of Ecology, Energy, Sustainable Development and the Sea, France
Stefan / Nehring / Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), Germany
Branka / Tavzes / Ministry of the environment and spatial planning, Slovenia
Huw / Thomas / Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, UK
Hans / Van Gossum / Agency for Nature and Forest - FaunaFlora, Belgium
Organisations
Marie-Alice / Budniok / European Landowners' Organization – ELO asbl
Eladio / Fernández-Galiano / Council of Europe
Andrea / Graham / Copa-Cogeca (NFU)
Andras / Krolopp / IUCN
Angus / Middleton / Federation of Associations for Hunting and Conservation
Vadim / Panov / Regional Euro-Asian Biological Invasions Centre
Alex / Ploeg / European Pet Organization (EPO)
Christian / Ries / Musée d'histoire naturelle Luxembourg
Paul / Walton / BirdLife International
Marcus / Zisenis / European Topic Centre on Biological Diversity
Experts
Piero / Genovesi / ISPRA (Institute for Environmental Protection and Research), Italy
Isabel / Lorenzo / TRAGSATEC -Technical Assistance in the Ministry of the Environment and Rural and Marine Affairs, Spain.
Gabor / Lövei / Aarhus University, Denmark
Marc / Kenis / CABI Europe-Switzerland
Elizabete / Marchante / Centre for Functional Ecology. University of Coimbra, Portugal
François / Moutou / SFEPM +Anses, Laboratoire de Santé Animale, Unité épidémiologie, France
Helene / Nyegaard Hvid / European Network of Invasive Alien Species (NOBANIS)
Colette / O' Flynn / National Biodiversity Data Centre, Ireland
Wolfgang / Rabitsch / Environment AgencyAustria
Helen / Roy / Centre for EcologyHydrology, UK
Rumen / Tomov / University of forestry, Bulgaria
Ahmet / Uludag / European Environment Agency
Jochen / Vandekerkhove / European Commission - Joint Research Centre
Sonia / Vanderhoeven / Belgian Biodiversity Platform
Argyro / Zenetos / HCMR: Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, Greece
List of members WG3
Member StatesBata / Kinga / Ministry for Rural Development, Hungary
Sandra / Cellina / Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures - Département de l'environnement, Luxembourg
Ema / Gojdičová / State Nature Conservancy of SR, Regional Office, Slovakia
Merike / Linnamägi / Ministry of Environment, Estonia
Hélène / Menigaux / Ministry of Ecology, Energy, Sustainable Development and the Sea, France
Stefan / Nehring / Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), Germany
Iveta / Ozolina / Ministry of Agriculture, Latvia
Ewa / Pisarczyk / General Directorate for Environmental Protection, Poland
Sander / Smolders / Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation, the Netherlands
Branka / Tavzes / Ministry of the Environment and Spatial Planning, Slovenia
Huw / Thomas / Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, United Kingdom
Hans / Van Gossum / Agency for Nature and Forest - FaunaFlora, Belgium
Organisations
Caroline / Boström / Confederation Européenne des Propriétaires forestiers – CEPF
Kathleen / Laissy / European Bureau for Conservation and Development – EBCD
Marie-Alice / Budniok / European Landowners' Organization – ELO asbl
Fredrik / Dahl / Federation of Associations for Hunting and Conservation
Andrew / Kendall / European Squirrel Initiative
Staci / McLennan / Eurogroup for Animals/Eurogroup for Wildlife and Laboratory Animals (EWLA)
Ana / Nieto / IUCN Regional Office for Pan-Europe
Tania / Runge / Copa-Cogeca
Dick / Shaw / CABI
Paul / Walton / BirdLife International
Experts
Tim / Adriaens / Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO), Belgium
Giuseppe / Brundu / SardinianForest Service (CFVA)
Piero / Genovesi / ISPRA (Institute for Environmental Protection and Research), Italy
Werner / Steinheuer / Bayer CropScience AG , Sustainable Development
Isabel / Lorenzo / TRAGSATEC -Technical Assistance in the Ministry of the Environment and Rural and Marine Affairs, Spain
Gabor / Lövei / Aarhus University, Denmark
Hélia / Marchante / Escola Superior Agrária de Coimbra/Instituto Politécnico de Coimbra, Portugal
Jonathan / Newman / Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, UK
Christian / Ries / Musée d'histoire naturelle, Luxembourg
Peter / Robertson / Food and Environment Research Agency, UK
Ronaldo / Sousa / Department of Biology, University of Minho & CIIMAR – Centre of Marine and Environmental Research, Portugal
Catherine / Souty-Grosset / Université de Poitiers
Ecologie, Evolution, Symbiose, UMR CNRS 6556, France
Ahmet / Uludag / European Environment Agency
Financing and liability
The report "Assessment to support continued development of the EU Strategy to combat invasive alien species", Shine et al. (2010), Institute for European Environmental Policy, provides the Commission with useful elements to start reflecting on the financial needs of a comprehensive IAS policy. In particular, the report provides a preliminary estimate of the costs of inaction, amounting to about 12.5 billion EUR / year, and of the costs of action, ranging from around 40 million to 190 million EUR / year.
The report also highlights that the current distribution of costs and benefits of IAS action is uneven.Most costs associated with IAS control and lost production, ecosystem services and amenities have to be met by stakeholders on the ground, like foresters, water managers, local authorities.Meanwhile, the beneficiaries of activities providing pathways for IAS introduction/spread usually have few or no economic incentives to minimise such risks.
Generally, the environmental and socio-economic impacts of IAS are considered as externalities, with no one being held responsible. A smart policy mixis likely to be needed, consisting of regulations, positive and negative financial incentives and communication,as well as active participation in decision-making and voluntary initiatives. This would help to involvepublic and private actors and encourage them to shift towards low-risk practices and to internalise environmental costs associated with invasions (consistent with the approaches discussed in TEEB 2010). Voluntary (codes of conduct, green procurements policy, see Shine et al. 2010) and mandatory mechanisms may have to be combined.
This document focuses on mechanismsto ensure that IAS policyis properly financed and has the means to be correctly transposed and properly implemented across the EU. More precisely, itexplores some possible mechanisms that Member States could use to finance the implementation of the legislation at national level, although these mechanisms will not necessarily feature in the legislative instrument that will be proposed. The document is based on Shine et al. (2010), contributions to the working groups and specific feedback provided by Belgium, Latvia, Romania, Finland, Ornamental Fish International, CABI and the ETC-Biodiversity. The possible approaches described are not mutually exclusive.
1. Cost-recovery mechanisms
Cost recovery mechanisms will generally be established at MS-level. Such mechanismsshouldencourage industries and stakeholders to minimise risks associated with IAS and invest in preventive actions. Thecost recovery mechanismsshould at a minimum recovertheadministrative costs of handling the file (e.g. inspection costs), but they could also cover wider costs related to IAS caused by certain sectors (e.g. horticultural sector catering for costs caused by invasive horticultural alien species). They could thus contribute to reducing the burden on public budgets and even help raise revenues to be reinvested in activities to address the problems created by IAS. Cost-recovery mechanisms should always be proportional to the risk involved. The payment should include mechanisms through which the operators could reduce their payments by reducing the risks they cause.
These mechanisms:
- should be assessed and developed in close consultation and due time with concerned industries and stakeholders, as well as experts, and the public directly and indirectly concerned
- could be included in sectoral agreements and feed in public and/or private sector-specific funds for dealing with IAS-problems related to the sector in question, thus developing mechanisms to mutualise the risks
- could also feed into a designated national or regional fund for IAS-management
An “IAS pathway pays principle” could be established, so that stakeholders intentionally or unintentionally creating problems with IAS are made aware and held responsible. Doing so, cost recovery could be organised by pathway. Priority pathways could be identified, based on risk analysis.
Penalties for non-compliance are also a way for MS torecover costs. This is a standard general clause in all environmental legislation, and will therefore not be discussed here.
The following mechanisms could be considered:
1.1. Permits for activities involving AS that are/might become invasive
Such permits could be required for risky activities involving alien species that are/might become invasive (holding, release into the wild, or any other activity) and would be issued against a charge.This charge could covercosts of handling the file, incl. inspection frameworks, but could also be higher. Such systems are existing, e.g. for quarantine inspection and licences under the Plant Health regime in the UK.
Suchpermit could be depending on the approval of a risk management plan, incl. risk analysis, surveillance andcontingency planning.This is what happened for the psyllid release to test the control of Japanese knotweed in Great Britain. Also the acceptance of full responsibility for emergency response, monitoring and eradication might be required. This however might become difficult if species are released for public benefits (e.g. for controlling IAS). An important issue to consider is how to deal with the time lag between first introduction and invasive behaviour.
Ifrevenues arecollected from these permits, they could be either collected for general purposes or earmarked to address IAS problems.However, when utilising the permitting system to generate resources, it might all get really expensive,particularly if the beneficiary already had to invest in a risk management plan and keep provisions for emergency response, monitoring and eradication.
1.2.Charges for unintentional pathways of AS that are/might become invasive
Charges could be required foractivities known to unintentionally introduce alien species that are/might become invasive (e.g. ship ballast water) or even for the use of pathways known to be used by IAS (e.g. canals connecting different river basins). This could be a small percentage or a fixed fee.Charges could be depending on levels of risk the activities entail.
These charges could cover the handling of the file, incl. inspection frameworks, surveillance, EWRR, eradication, control of related IAS. Also here extra revenues could be collected (see above). Extra revenues could be collected from all operators in a sector, to feed into a fund for IAS control related to that sector.
Experiences fromFinland
Finland has experienceswith fee systems that contribute to the accumulation of a dedicated fund which could be used for developing and maintaining certain activities. Such a system is operational concerning for example oil spills and oil spill preparedness. A small fee is collected based on the amount of importing of oil and these funds are collected to a dedicate fund. The non-standard nature of alien species and their pathways complicate the construction of a fee system, but it could be considered in parallel with other cost-recovery systems.
1.3. Mandatory financial securities
Another possibility could be to require a financial security for economic operators that carry out activities that entail a risk of introduction of AS that are or might become invasive. Also here priority pathways, identified by risk assessment, could be targeted. Financial securities have been addressed in the Environmental Liability Directive and in the Mining Waste Directive.
In this option, stakeholders involved in risky activities intentionally or unintentionally involving AS that are or might become invasive(holding, release into the wild, or any other activity)could be required to put-down a financial guarantee (condition to receive a permit?) which would be used to cover possible IAS damages caused by the operator who has been held liable.
1.4. Mandatory insurance
An alternative to the previous cost recovery mechanism could be based on the requirement for operators involved in activities that entail a risk of intentional or unintentional introduction of AS that are or might become invasive (holding, release into the wild, or any other activity) (condition to receive a permit?), to subscribe to a mandatory insurance which could bear the costs of any damage caused by the operator(cf.full responsibility for emergency response, monitoring and eradication of IAS)
This option could be complemented by a system of collectiveIAS-insurance schemes for collective responsibility of a sector.
2. Liability
The success of some of the above mechanisms depends on the establishment of a liabilitysystem, whereby operators, whose activities involve alien species, would be held liable for damages caused by alien species that escaped their control and cause environmental damage and would bear the cost of remedial action.
This may entail the extension of Environmental Liability Directive to additional occupational activities and would require a general duty of care (e.g. controlling plant species spreading beyond garden, cleaning boat when leaving contaminated water,…) for occupational and non-occupational activities.
The difficulty will be the practical assessment of a negative impact on the environment (see also case study below). For example: can hybridisation with a native species be detected, for which area, and at which point can this be justified as being negative, in the long or short term? Was it really this introduction of an IAS or another hybridisation earlier or from another origin simultaneously? A legal case (at court) is likely to demand much more secure evidence to chargea responsible. To prove the origin and the damage caused might be very difficult in many cases of IAS.
3. Efficient use of public funds
For the components of an IAS-policy that would not be addressed through cost-recovery mechanisms, public funding would be needed.
An important issue will also be to avoid contradictingincentives, incoherence or waste in the use of funding(e.g. funding to support the planting of Robiniafor wood production and erosion control and in parallel funding projects for Robinia eradication).This is in line with action 17c of the EU Biodiversity Strategy: eliminating harmful subsidies at both EU and MemberState level.
Major components thatmay require public funding are:
- General surveillance
-A way to reduce these costs: relying more widely on citizen science
- Information and early warning system
-A way to reduce these costs: building on and connecting existing IAS-information systems
- Horizon scanning, prioritisation for RA, RA-framework, RAs for blacklisting, reviewing RAs
-A way to reduce these costs: building on provisions and mechanisms of the Plant Health Regime