Regulation of import and release of mass-produced natural enemies: a risk-assessment approach

In the past 30 years, many exotic natural enemies have been imported, mass-reared and released as biological control agents. Negative effects of these releases have not been reported yet. The current popularity of biological control may, however, result in problems, as an increasing number of activities will be executed by persons not trained in the identification, evaluation and release of biocontrol agents. Therefore, protocols for risk assessment are being developed within the European Union (EU)-financed project 'Evaluating Environmental Risks of Biological Control Introductions into Europe' (ERBIC) as a basis for regulation of the import and release of exotic natural enemies. This chapter presents a summary of the situation concerning regulations for the import and release of natural enemies, a general framework for risk-assessment procedures for biological control agents, and a more detailed framework on the methodology for risk assessment of natural enemies. In the methodology for risk assessment, information on the potential of an agent to establish, its abilities to disperse and its direct and indirect effects, including host-specificity testing, is integrated