Cargo deliveries from China with goods placed on wooden pallets are a way in which a dangerous illegal immigrant – the Asian longhorned beetle – can enter our country; it is a large, black pest with long antennae that can cause mass dieback of deciduous trees, warns Evija Kučinska, Senior Inspector at the Phytosanitary Supervision Division of the Plant Quarantine Department of the State Plant Protection Service.

We must protect our borders not only from illegal immigrants attempting to enter Latvia from other countries but also from small and much harder to spot foreign harmful organisms, which we can unknowingly import with exotic plants or wood packaging material. Plant protection products are also frequently delivered on wooden pallets.

My role at the State Plant Protection Service is to carry out phytosanitary control and supervision of wood packaging material. In a sense, I perform border control for such shipments to detect harmful organisms and invasive plant species in time and prevent them from reaching Latvia.

When travelling to exotic lands, we rarely consider that all the beautiful and interesting things we want to buy can also be very dangerous. People travel a lot with their families and friends and often want to bring home some beautiful souvenirs for themselves or their loved ones. Have we considered how much economic damage these souvenirs can cause to Latvia?

One very dangerous pest that likes to travel is the wood-boring Asian longhorned beetle (Anoplophora glabripennis). It is a dangerous pest of deciduous trees that can enter the country with tree planting material and wood packaging material used for cargo transport. Once established, the pest can cause mass dieback of deciduous trees, which occupy a significant portion of all forest areas in Latvia.

The Asian longhorned beetle is a wood-borer that entered Europe from Asia with wooden packaging material manufactured in China used to transport paving stones, marble slabs, and similar goods. A few years ago, the Asian longhorned beetle was discovered in Finland, near Helsinki, next to a company that imported stones using wooden pallets. The pest had already begun its destructive work in the birch and willow trees growing near the company.

Visually, the Asian longhorned beetle is a handsome beetle – about 20-35 mm long, shiny black with white spots. It has long, segmented antennae that resemble whiskers. The mature larva is up to 50 mm long and cream-white. Small birds in Finland and Latvia do not recognise such massive larvae and do not use them as a food source, which means the pests have no natural enemies.

The Asian longhorned beetle is a dangerous deciduous pest that damages many tree species – maples, birches, aspens, lindens, hazels, elms, alders, horse chestnuts, willows, etc., as well as fruit trees, including apple and pear trees. The main visual signs used to detect the presence of the longhorned beetle are the holes the beetles chew in the wood – wide, round exit holes 9-11 mm in diameter, through which the young beetles leave the tree.

So far, the Asian longhorned beetle has not been detected in Latvia, but there is no shortage of other foreign harmful organisms that we can import with exotic plants, packaging material, as well as via shipping containers and vehicles. For example, when buying a Japanese maple, we might be bringing home a "gift" in the form of the citrus longhorned beetle. This wood-borer is no less dangerous than the Asian longhorned beetle.

International travel and trade increase the chance that various harmful organisms cross borders along with travellers, shipments, or cargo, allowing new diseases to spread very quickly. We must carefully examine what we order online and what we buy in foreign countries. It may be beautiful, but it can also be dangerous.

To improve public understanding of the importance of plant health and our daily actions that threaten it, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) is currently running the “Plant Health for Life” campaign or #PlantHealth4Life. On the campaign website, materials are available, also translated into Latvian, which you can share on your social media channels.

Let us not allow foreign pests to enter Latvia, as they have the ability to adapt and soon feel at home here too. By not importing plants from other countries, we can work together to ensure a healthier future for ourselves, the environment, and society as a whole! By maintaining plant health, we protect life!