科研人员发现，入侵物种造成的最坏的后果出现在鼓励了引入这些物种的经济增长之后的许多年，这提示生物入侵可能在将来变得越来越难以控制。Stefan Dullinger及其同事审视了28个欧洲国家在1900年到2000年之间的外来物种数量和经济活动。这组作者发现，目前在一个国家发现的入侵物种的数量更多地反映了该国在1900年而非2000年的社会经济活动。这些发现提示，一种物种的引入与它野外落户常常相隔了很长一段时间。此外，这组作者发现，大多数的物种引入发生在20世纪的后半叶，当时大多数欧洲国家经历了社会经济增长。这组科研人员说，这些结果提示未来的入侵物种问题的种子现在已经种下了，他们预测入侵物种的数量将在未来几十年中将会增加，造成了一种所谓的“入侵债”。这组作者建议，控制入侵物种的措施应该扩展到整个欧洲联盟，把重点不仅仅放在目前每个国家发现的最有害的物种上，也要放在开发早期预警和快速应对系统上，从而管理在未来有可能带来最严重的威胁的物种。

原文出处：

PNAS  doi: 10.1073/pnas.1011728108

Socioeconomic legacy yields an invasion debt

Franz Essla,b,1, Stefan Dullingerc,d,1,2, Wolfgang Rabitscha, Philip E. Hulmeb, Karl Hülberc,d, Vojtěch Jaro?íke,f, Ingrid Kleinbauerc, Fridolin Krausmanng, Ingolf Kühnh, Wolfgang Nentwigi, Montserrat Vilàj, Piero Genovesik, Francesca Gherardil, Marie-Laure Desprez-Loustaum, Alain Roquesn, and Petr Py?eke,f

Abstract

Globalization and economic growth are widely recognized as important drivers of biological invasions. Consequently, there is an increasing need for governments to address the role of international trade in their strategies to prevent species introductions. However, many of the most problematic alien species are not recent arrivals but were introduced several decades ago. Hence, current patterns of alien-species richness may better reflect historical rather than contemporary human activities, a phenomenon which might be called “invasion debt.” Here, we show that across 10 taxonomic groups (vascular plants, bryophytes, fungi, birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, fish, terrestrial insects, and aquatic invertebrates) in 28 European countries, current numbers of alien species established in the wild are indeed more closely related to indicators of socioeconomic activity from the year 1900 than to those from 2000, although the majority of species introductions occurred during the second half of the 20th century. The strength of the historical signal varies among taxonomic groups, with those possessing good capabilities for dispersal (birds, insects) more strongly associated with recent socioeconomic drivers. Nevertheless, our results suggest a considerable historical legacy for the majority of the taxa analyzed. The consequences of the current high levels of socioeconomic activity on the extent of biological invasions will thus probably not be completely realized until several decades into the future.