Purpose of Initiative: The Global Invasive Species Programme (GISP) is designed to help develop an international consensus on strategies to reduce the threat to human health, the environment, and economic prosperity posed by invasive alien species (IAS). Invasive alien species are plants or animals native to one region that often spread rapidly when introduced into an area where they did not previously occur naturally, displacing or even eliminating native species. It is important to note however, that not all non-native species are invasive. Non-native species are extremely important sources of food, fiber and recreation. Only a small fraction of non-native species that are introduced to a new environment become established and an even smaller number of those are considered harmful and therefore invasive. Invasive alien species, such as the West Nile virus and zebra mussels, are moving around the world into new regions, where they can spread unchecked. The annual global economic loss to agriculture, biodiversity, fisheries, forests, and industry, caused by invasive species has been estimated at approximately five percent of the global economy, or U.S. $1.4 trillion. In the U.S. alone the annual impact has been estimated at $138 billion¹. As a GISP partner, the U.S. Government supports and promotes international efforts to combat the spread of these species.

Partners: Governments : Brazil, Costa Rica, Denmark, South Africa, Thailand, the United States, and Zambia. International Organizations and Agreements : Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE), IUCN - The World Conservation Union, International Maritime Organization, International Plant Protection Convention, CAB International, and the Convention on Biological Diversity. Non-governmental organizations : The Nature Conservancy, Bishop Museum of Hawaii; National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, and the Packard Foundation.

Partnership Goals: The partnerhip's primary goals are to raise global awareness of the problems associated with invasive species and to initiate actions by partners to develop cooperative mechanisms, strategies and tools to address the problem.

Progress Toward Goals:  The U.S. has sponsored GISP's coordinated capacity building workshops in seven regions around the globe, with the goal of bringing together government officials and non-governmental experts to share information and develop cooperative strategies for dealing with the invasive species problem. The first U.S.-sponsored GISP regional workshop was held in Denmark for the Nordic-Baltic region in 2001. In May 2002, Estonia hosted a follow-up workshop and participants produced a plan for a regional invasive alien species information network and inventory and monitoring system for invasive alien species in the Baltic region. A website documenting the invasive species in the Nordic region is now available at http://www.sns.dk/natur/nnis.

Five additional regional workshops were held during 2001 and 2002: Costa Rica for the Meso-America and the western Caribbean, Brazil for South America, Zambia for Southern Africa, Thailand for South and Southeast Asia, and the United States (Hawaii) for the Austral-Pacific. The seventh and final regional workshop, for Western Africa, was held in Accra, Ghana in March of 2004. Additionally, the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. Geological Survey, and The Nature Conservancy convened a workshop in Washington, D.C. in April of 2004 to address the mechanisms for developing a global invasive species informatics network (GISIN), the final proceedings of which are now available on line at http://invasivespecies.nbii.gov/as/GISIN.htm. This workshop, the original brainchild of the GISP informatics working group, confirmed that the GISIN will be a key tool for achieving the cooperation strategies identified at the earlier regional workshops.

Next Steps: GISP has recently published the proceedings from the regional workshops that occurred in 2001 and 2002. The proceedings from each of these workshops highlight the strategies agreed upon by country delegates from each of the regions, and summarize the necessary actions for each region to meet the goals of their strategy. GISP will publish the Western Africa proceedings shortly, and a synthesis document addressing the major findings from each of the regions in late 2004. Future actions of the U.S. partnership with GISP will be focused on implementation of regional strategies addressing IAS, and fine-tuning the tools needed for better cooperation.

Resources: Through its National Invasive Species Council (NISC), consisting of forty USG agencies and Departments² the USG provides technical and financial assistance in support of GISP's international activities to minimize the risk and impact of invasive alien species on human health, economic development, and the environment. Through the regional workshops, the U.S. State Department has funded GISP in excess of $350,000 to coordinate five of the seven regional workshops previously discussed, and USAID has contributed an additional $150,000 to support two of these workshops.

USG Primary Points of Contacts: National Invasive Species Council: Richard Orr (Phone: 202/354-1886, E-mail: Richard_Orr@ios.doi.gov); Department of State: Jeff Fisher (Phone: 202/647-0199, E-mail: fisherjp@state.gov).

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^[1] Pimental, D. editor. 2002. see Biological invasions: economic and environmental costs of alien plant, animal, and microbe species. CRC Press, Boca Raton, Florida.

^[2] Agency for International Development, Department of Agriculture, Department of Commerce, Department of Defense, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Interior, Department of State, Department of Transportation, Department of Treasury, Environmental Protection Agency, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of U.S. Trade Representative. For full listing go to www.invasivespecies.gov.

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