Posted: Wednesday, April 1, 2009, 4:44 p.m., EDT

The Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council, a Washington, D.C.-based pet industry trade group, warned pet industry members that a Congressional subcommittee had scheduled a hearing for legislation that could effectively halt trade in thousands of nonnative species in the United States, including most birds, reptiles and fish and several mammals (hamsters, gerbils, guinea pigs and ferrets) commonly kept as pets. The legislation currently exempts dogs, cats, horses and goldfish (Carassius auratus auratus) and a variety of farm animals.

The House Committee on Natural Resources Subcommittee on Insular Affairs, Oceans and Wildlife has scheduled a hearing on House Resolution 669 for April 23.

PIJAC is urging members to contact committee members about concerns with the proposed legislation.

Essentially, the legislation would require the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to create lists of approved and non-approved species for nonnative wildlife based on risk assessments of the species’ potential likelihood to “cause economic or environmental harm or harm to another animal species’ health or human health.”

Currently, species are banned under the Lacey Act only once they’re determined to be an actual threat.

One of PIJAC’s main concerns with the legislation include the difficulty in proving a species, including the thousands that have already been in trade in the U.S. for decades or more, would not be able to establish and spread wild populations in some portion of the country. For example, would a species that could be a threat in Hawaiian waters really be a threat in Kansas or Arizona.

PIJAC is also concerned that the legislation calls for funding the risk assessment program through user fees, which could be difficult to raise for smaller market species.

Also, the Fish and Wildlife Service does not have the resources to conduct risk assessments under the legislation’s timetables (37 months from the bill’s enactment to assess all nonnative species compared to average 4 years to find a species harmful under the current Lacey Act), according to PIJAC. The Fish & Wildlife Service could also determine if it has insufficient scientific and commercial information to determine a species is either approved or unapproved, effectively banning trade in those species.

That is because the legislation prohibits import into or export from the United States, and interstate transportation of, any species not specifically listed on the approved list. It also bans the possession or trade, breeding and release into the wild of such species. Animal owners who owned their animals prior to the risk assessment’s beginning would be allowed to keep their animals, under the proposed legislation.

Species that may be harmful but are already “so widespread in the United States that it is clear to the Secretary that any import prohibitions or restrictions would have no practical utility” could be included on the approved list.

PIJAC also calls the risk assessment too simplistic and prefers a risk analysis approach instead. The risk analysis would consider socio-economic factors as well. <HOME>