PestLens: An early-warning system supporting United States safeguarding against exotic plant pests

To protect United States agriculture and natural resources against the introduction and establishment of exotic plant pests, the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Plant Protection and Quarantine (PPQ) carries out numerous safeguarding functions, which depend on current information about exotic plant pests. PestLens, a cooperative effort of PPQ and the Center for Integrated Pest Management at North Carolina State University, is a web-based early warning system that helps PPQ stay current on newly emerging pest information and provides a mechanism for documenting and coordinating safeguarding actions. PestLens gathers information from a wide range of sources, including several hundred scientific journals, web sites, e-mail groups, newsletters, and automated internet search queries; summarizes this information and provides relevant background knowledge; reports the information in a weekly e-mail notification; provides a conceptual framework for making and coordinating safeguarding decisions; and makes the original information, as well as resulting decisions and actions, accessible through a web-enabled database.