A weed risk minimisation strategy for the European olive, Olea europaea ssp. europaea, in Tasmania

摘要

The European olive (Olea europaea ssp. europaea) is the focus of an emerging industry in Tasmania. It is also a serious environmental weed in several areas of mainland southern Australia. This paper describes a weed awareness initiative, the aim of which is to assist the management of the potential weed risk posed by the European olive to Tasmania's natural environment. A range of factors indicates a precautionary approach is justified, even in the absence of feral olive plants in Tasmania at present. The Feral Olive Working Group considered what Tasmanian growers could do to reduce potential olive weed risk. The output of the group's discussions over 18 months is a five-part strategy. This addresses the need for better tracking of the industry's size, distribution and growth, a code of practice which reduces the spread of seed from groves, a weed risk assessment for individual groves, an education and awareness program and strategy adoption incentives. Each component requires sustained activity into the long term, continued agency/industry cooperation and periodic review. Education and awareness initiatives underpin the strategy throughout and the need to inform these with research that assesses the weed risk of this plant in different Tasmanianenvironments is highlighted. The ongoing role of growers in data collection is critical. The initiative demonstrates an initial willingness by the local industry to acknowledge environmental responsibilities. This is a novel approach to preventative weedmanagement in Tasmania because its subject is a problem yet to develop, for a plant with apparent commercial promise. Typically, the weed risk of a new plant enterprise is given little attention relative to its commercial outlook. The strategy seeks todemonstrate one approach to reconciling these two attributes.