--- Keith Henson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: <snip> > Getting the bill passed, however, will be a > struggle, Ehlers said. Several > committees have jurisdiction; coordinating policies > across international > borders is tricky; and some members of Congress need > to be better educated > about the issue. (According to Ehlers, at one > hearing about the problem of > zebra mussels in the Great Lakes, one puzzled > representative asked why they > should spend so much money on "zebras' muscles.") > http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20040322/03
The cost, for one: "Invasive species are a major cause of extinctions, second only to habitat destruction, and they exact a cost of approximately $120 billion per year in the United States alone, according to Lori Williams, executive director of the National Invasive Species Council (NISC), a cross-agency council formed in 1999 by executive order from President Clinton..." "...Government agencies are not only failing to cooperate, but, in some cases, are even working against each other, said Ann Bartuska, deputy chief for research and development at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service. For example, while the National Park Service was attempting to prevent buffelgrass, which was intentionally introduced into the southwest United States as a source of hardy vegetation, from spreading to parklands and pushing out native plants, the USDA was simultaneously developing a hardier, cold-resistant buffelgrass strain. NISC is intended to help mediate such discrepancies and craft a "national management plan" every 2 years..." Debbi Pushme-Pullyou Maru __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Finance Tax Center - File online. File on time. http://taxes.yahoo.com/filing.html _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
