Cost of Weeds

Summary

Weeds impact the grazing industries in various ways through losses of pasture production, animal poisoning, downgrading of products and in some cases are barriers to trade. Because there are many species with potential to impact on the grazing and limited funding for management, it is necessary to identify where investment should be targeted for cost effective on ground action.
Several attempts have been made to prioritise weeds at a national scale and this project considers whether the Weeds of National Significance model (72 species) can be used for this purpose. The ranking derived from this model has been compared with Grice (2004) (119 species) who considered them on a regional basis for research priorities.
The analysis considered the economic costs, environmental and social impacts where data was available.
Twenty five species were ranked based on their cost to industry and these species were broadly consistent with those identified by Grice (2004). Many of the species considered had not reached their full extent of naturalization in Australia leading to the conclusion that preventing spread to uninfested areas is the most cost effective activity that can be undertaken by the grazing industries.