Why Should We Care About Marine Biological Invasions?

 

Social & Economic Stability:

The political, economic and social stabilities of all nations depend on stable and reliable food sources.   Terrestrial and marine biological invasions threaten these resources by replacing useful and edible species with useless or harmful species.

Food:

As the world’s population increases the earth will be taxed to provide enough food for everyone and the oceans have and will continue to provide much of this food. Anthropogenic (human caused) species introductions  threaten this food source. Of the thousands of species that live in the world’s oceans, mankind eats and usese relatively few. These species must consume other plant and animal species to grow and mature. Our ocean food supply therefore, depends on maintaining a large and diverse number of marine species.

Maintenance of Biodiversity:

Many of man’s most useful resouces come from nature such as silk, wool, leather, wood, rubber, adhesives, and drugs, many antibiotics. Losses of biodiversity will reduce access to these resources that we know of and the future potential discoveries of the many resources we don't yet know about.

How do we decide whether species are introduced?