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. 2007 Nov 21;2(11):e1208.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0001208.

Fast economic development accelerates biological invasions in China

Wen Lin  1 , Guofa Zhou, Xinyue Cheng, Rumei Xu
Affiliations

Fast economic development accelerates biological invasions in China

Wen Lin et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Increasing levels of global trade and intercontinental travel have been cited as the major causes of biological invasion. However, indirect factors such as economic development that affect the intensity of invasion have not been quantitatively explored. Herein, using principal factor analysis, we investigated the relationship between biological invasion and economic development together with climatic information for China from the 1970s to present. We demonstrate that the increase in biological invasion is coincident with the rapid economic development that has occurred in China over the past three decades. The results indicate that the geographic prevalence of invasive species varies substantially on the provincial scale, but can be surprisingly well predicted using the combination of economic development (R(2) = 0.378) and climatic factors (R(2) = 0.347). Economic factors are proven to be at least equal to if not more determinant of the occurrence of invasive species than climatic factors. International travel and trade are shown to have played a less significant role in accounting for the intensity of biological invasion in China. Our results demonstrate that more attention should be paid to economic factors to improve the understanding, prediction and management of biological invasions.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. The total GDP and number of introduced invasive species into China.
The total GDP is from 1959 to 1999, and the number of introduced invasive species into China is from 1940 to 1999.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Distribution of the number of invasive species and average GDP in each province in China.
The two bars (red bar for the number of invasive species, blue bar for average GDP from 1985 to 2004) are standardized with same height in Guangdong province which has the highest average GDP (76.7 billion USD) and the highest abundance of invasive species (117 species).
Figure 3
Figure 3. Relationship between biological, economical and climatic factors that determined the occurrence and spread of invasive species.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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