WASHINGTON, Oct. 8, 2008-Universities in six states are recipients of federal funding to conduct research on measures to combat harmful pests and diseases, Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer announced today. The U.S. Department of Agriculture will award $974,000 this year for studies to examine the economic effects and efficiency of strategies to prevent, control, or eradicate invasive pests.

The agreements announced today will provide funding to universities in Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, and Nevada. These research projects are competitively awarded by the Program of Research on the Economics of Invasive Species Management (PREISM), administered by USDA's Economic Research Service (ERS). Among the subjects the projects will examine are:

• economic tradeoffs of strategies for managing white pine blister rust in high-altitude pine forests used for recreation;
• contractual arrangements that encourage ranchers to manage wildfire-inducing weeds in the Great Basin, tradeoffs between preemptive and restorative weed management, and gains from coordinating weed and wildfire risk management resources across multiple agencies and private entities;
• decision support for analyzing risk of potentially invasive, imported ornamental plants, considering economic effects and characteristics of successful invaders;
• the potential for alternative mechanisms, such as marketable invasion permits and performance bonds, to encourage grower use of integrated pest management;
• the effect of phytosanitary policies, such as pre-clearance, pre-treatment, and World Trade Organization notifications, on pest risks in agricultural produce imports and the implications for allocation of surveillance resources;
• structural characteristics of a robust, economically efficient surveillance network for early discovery of emerging animal diseases.

The complete list of awards is attached. PREISM studies will provide analytically based principles, guidelines, and criteria for invasive species policy and program decision making, as well as the economic information, modeling systems, or other tools that support the decision making. Further information about these projects is on the web at: http://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/InvasiveSpecies/.

FY 2008 PREISM Competitive Awards

Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, CO, $178,000 - The project will analyze economic tradeoffs of proactive and reactive management strategies for white pine blister rust in high-altitude, non-timber pine forests. Researchers will consider non-market values and attitudes of recreational users, when evaluating management options for affected and threatened areas.

University of Nevada-Reno, Reno, NV, $178,000 - The study will examine contractual mechanisms to encourage ranchers to preemptively manage weeds, such as cheatgrass, that induce wildfire in the Great Basin. Researchers will also examine tradeoffs between preemptive and restorative weed management policies, and efficiency gains from coordinating allocation of weed and wildfire risk management resources across multiple agencies and private entities.

University of Georgia, Athens, GA, $174,000 - The researchers will develop cost-sensitive decision support tools to aid risk analysis of potentially invasive, imported ornamental plant species, using information about taxonomy, ecology, and biological features gained prior to importation. The project will use the characteristics of successful plant invaders and the potential economic effects of such invasions to develop algorithms and visual decision trees that aid risk classification.

University of Maryland, College Park, MD, $172,000 - The study will investigate the effect of alternative phytosanitary policies, such as pre-clearance, pre-treatment requirements, and World Trade Organization (WTO) notifications, on invasive pest risks in imports and the implications for allocating surveillance resources. The researchers will analyze risk factors for pest introductions in imports of fruits and vegetables, cut flowers, and propagative plant materials, using APHIS inspections data and information on phytosanitary policy from the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations and the WTO notification database.

University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, $147,000 - The project will investigate the structural characteristics of a surveillance network for emerging animal diseases that will be most robust in early discovery of unknown or undetected diseases while adhering to performance and cost criteria. Methods will address network structure, speed of information flow, and the effects of severe uncertainty about disease spread and surveillance networks.

Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, $125,000 - The researchers will compare mechanisms, such as Pigouvian taxes, marketable invasion permits, and performance bonds, that could encourage growers to use integrated pest management to combat a potential pest invasion, focusing on the pesticide-resistant whitefly on Arizona cotton. They will estimate relationships between infestations, crop yield and quality, and control costs to achieve a pest population level below acceptable injury levels.