Risk assessment in support of plant health

Abstract

With the establishment of the Plant Health Panel in 2006, EFSA became the body responsible for risk assessment in the plant health area for the European Union (EU). Since then more than 70 outputs have been produced dealing with the full range of organisms harmful to plant health across all crop types and plants in the environment. There has been an increasing trend towards producing scientific opinions which are full pest risk assessments for the whole EU territory. In its work, and as a contribution to the wider development of risk assessment methodology, the Panel has developed a series of guidance documents. These deal with the peer review of existing pest risk assessments, a framework for conducting risk assessments which harmonise standards set by the International Plant Protection Convention and the legislative requirements of the EU, and extension of this framework to include environmental risk assessment and the evaluation of risk reducing options. Quantitative approaches have become increasingly important during this time. The Panel has developed such methods in climatic mapping (in association with the Joint Research Councils), application of spatial spread models, re-evaluation of quantitative pathway analyses, and in statistical modelling of experimental data. A Plant Health Network has been established to facilitate interaction with EU Member States, especially in relation to data collection and co-ordination of risk assessment activities. At the current time a revision of the EU Plant Health Regime is being formulated. The legislative consequences of the revision will be of considerable significance for the work of the Plant Health Panel.

EFSA 2017 Workshop on Crisis Preparedness – Plant Health

“…The EFSA Scientific Panel on Plant Health (hereafter the PLH Panel) was established in 2006, four years after the establishment of EFSA, with the Commission Regulation (EC) No 575/2006 3 , recognising the protection of plant health as an essential factor in the security of the food chain. The PLH Panel provides independent scientific advice on risks posed by non-endemic living organisms harmful to plants and/or plant products that are associated with movement of plants and/or plant products and that may enter, establish, spread and cause harmful effects on plant production and plants in the environment (Jeger et al, 2012).…”

Network epidemiology and plant trade networks

“…Plant passporting schemes and their associated trace-forward and trace-back data hold much potential to reconstruct plant mobility patterns, but this potential still waits to be exploited. Also in the case of plant health, molecular advances and international regulations are developing tools to counterbalance the risks posed by globalization, but there is a need to improve the uptake of network approaches by plant health authorities ( Brasier 2008 ; MacLeod et al 2010 ; Jeger et al 2012 ; Hantula et al 2014 ). Research is needed to test whether there is heterogeneity in the average commuting distances of plants-for-planting of different species and in various regions.…”

The EFSA assessment of Trichilogaster acaciaelongifoliae as biocontrol agent of the invasive alien plant Acacia longifolia: a new area of activity for the EFSA Plant Health Panel?

“…The PLH Panel is responsible for risk assessment in the domain of plant health for European Union (EU) (Schans et al ., ; Jeger et al ., ). This group of 21 experts, renewed every 3 years, provides Scientific Opinions on risks posed by living organisms harmful to plants and/or plant products.…”

“…1 In 2006, recognizing the protection of plant health to be an essential factor in the security of the food chain, the EFSA Scientific Panel on Plant Health (PLH Panel) was established. 2 The PLH Panel is responsible for risk assessment in the domain of plant health for European Union (EU) (Schans et al, 2008;Jeger et al, 2012). This group of 21 experts, renewed every 3 years, provides Scientific Opinions on risks posed by living organisms harmful to plants and/or plant products.…”

“…Such threats to plant health are associated with the movement of plants and/or plant products and they may enter, establish, spread and cause harmful effects to plant production and plants in the environment in the EU. The main outputs of the PLH Panel are risk assessments and evaluations of risk reduction options, evaluations of pest risk analysis documents prepared by third parties, and guidance documents (Jeger et al, 2012). In Europe and worldwide plant health is increasingly threatened by the introduction of emerging pests and pathogens and by other drivers of global change (Pautasso et al, 2015).…”