The light brown apple moth eradication program: unsafe, unnecessary, ineffective.
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National Academy of Sciences Report
An expert panel of the National Research Council (NRC) of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) reviewed the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) justification for the LBAM program as presented in a response to two petitions requesting that LBAM be reclassified so that it would no longer require quarantines and treatments, based on the lack of damage LBAM has done in the U.S. and elsewhere.
 
The panel found scientific support lacking for almost all of USDA’s claims regarding LBAM, e.g., that the science does not support that is a recent arrival in California that can do significant damage, that LBAM is spreading, and that LBAM can be eradicated. The panel found that USDA misrepresented or lacked sources for its conclusions, used inaccurate models and drew inappropriate conclusions from them, and used “inconsistent and sometimes incomprehensible analytic techniques” for its analysis of potential economic damage from LBAM.
 
Some highlights from the panel’s report:  
  1. • USDA “did not conduct a thorough and balanced analysis.”
  2. • “The prediction of the potential geographic distribution of LBAM in the U.S.... and all economic analyses based on it are questionable and in need of reassessment with a more rigorous approach.”
  3. • “The statement that the recent trapping daa from infested areas show a progressively increasing population is misleading...”
  4. • “The committee has substantial concerns about the economic component...based primarily on the ambiguous foundation for the analysis for the predicted geographic distribution of LBAM and the inconsistent and sometimes incomprehensible analytic techniques used,”
  5. • “There is substantial uncertainty about the ability of LBAM to spread geographically, about its host range, and about the severity of damage it can inflict.”
  6. • USDA “provides no sources to substantiate damage estimates.”
  7. • “In contrast with the implications of [USDA’s] response, the available literature does not provide compelling evidence that LBAM is an important pest of silviculture.”
  8. • “It is debatable whether [USDA] has met either” of the criteria for a successful eradication program.
 
Read the full NAS/NRC report.
Read Press Coverage: “Shoddy Science.”