Testimony of National Environmental Coalition on Invasive Species before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Hearing on the Importation of Exotic Species and the Impact on Public Health and Safety.

The member organizations of the National Environmental Coalition on Invasive Species (NECIS) urge you to co-sponsor the National Aquatic Invasive Species Act (NAISA), S. 770. NAISA will amend and improve the Nonindigenous Aquatic Nuisance Prevention and Control Act of 1990.

Invaders are irreparably destroying the environment and our natural heritage, costing an estimated, conservative $138 billion dollars annually, and eroding the quality of life for citizens across the country. Preventing and controlling the spread of aquatic invasive species is not merely an environmental protection issue; aquatic invasive species must be treated as an immediate priority if the United States is to maintain the multitude of benefits its waters provide its citizens, including benefits that most individuals assume as rights, such as clean drinking water, fishing resources and recreational access.

The following is a summary of the ballast water provisions of H.R. 2830, legislation authorizing appropriations for the Coast Guard for FY 2008. The legislation has been approved by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and is expected to be considered by the full House of Representatives this month. The legislation is of critical importance to prevent the introduction and spread of aquatic invasive species in the Great Lakes.

Although invasive species may cause local damage, their impacts go well beyond state borders. The Office of Technology Assessment’s 1993 report and countless others call for federal action to address invasive species problems, but progress so far has been woefully inadequate. However, there are opportunities to act. We call upon the U.S. Congress and President Bush to immediately take the following steps to benefit our Nation.

Testimony of The National Environmental Coalition on Invasive Species before Joint Oversight Hearing, House Committee on Resources Subcommittee on Fisheries Conservation, Wildlife and Oceans and Subcommittee on National Parks, Recreation and Public Lands.

Although the serious consequences caused by invasive species reaching our shores have received considerable attention, the problems caused when U.S. species land in other countries has not. Exported species have caused extensive damage to other nations, but little progress has been made toward creating policy, both international and domestic, to mitigate the exportation of potentially invasive species. Today, we continue to send species, intentionally and unintentionally, from the United States to other nations. These species can be transported by air, land, and sea through tourism, military operations, trade, development assistance projects, and industry expansion. Here are just some of the problem species we have exported.

Testimony of the National Environmental Coalition on Invasive Species before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Hearing on the Importation of Exotic Species and the Impact on Public Health and Safety. Invasions by exotic plants, animals, and pathogens into non-native environments pose one of the most significant, but least addressed, threats to human health, agriculture and our natural ecosystems. Monkey pox, SARS and West Nile virus are the new buzzwords of public health, as communicable diseases increasingly leap hosts from animals to humans. In the United States, in 2002 alone, West Nile virus claimed more than 60 lives among constituencies represented by this committee and sickened more than a 1,000 people. Deliberate animal imports (legal or illegal) are thought to be one of the most likely ways that WNV got to New York City in 1999.

This talk will look at untapped opportunities to catalyze change and prevent new
introductions of AIS by international commercial vessel transportation. It will identify approaches being actively pursued, as well as options just being debated. What they all have in common is that they are ways we can better prevent invasions. There are ways we can do more. And ultimately this talk intends to illustrate that we have substantially more authority to protect the Lakes than is currently being exercised.

Many of the most important pathways by which invasive species enter the country result from the movement of goods in trade. As the largest economy in the world, the U.S. has over 20 of the world’s 30 busiest airports, receives nearly half of all ocean-going vessels each year and admits over 57,000 trucks and 1.1 million visitors daily. Thus, there are ample opportunities for invasive species to enter into the U.S. by land, air or water.