Description
The species list of alien taxa in South Africa was developed as part of triennial national status reports on biological invasions. It therefore includes: taxa that are, have been, or were proposed to be regulated; alien taxa that are or have been present in South Africa (including those only ever recorded in quarantine facilities); taxa that are native to a part of South Africa that have formed native-alien populations in another part of the country; and taxa which have been recorded at some point as alien or for which the risk of invasion has been evaluated. The list also includes information on the invasion status of the taxa, their pathways, distributions, impacts, and management, with metadata provided for all 38 variables, including confidence and data sources for 23 of them. Based on information up to the end of December 2022, the checklist includes over 6000 taxa, of which over 3500 are alien taxa confirmed as present outside of captivity or cultivation. However, several key data sources still need to be verified and integrated into the list (particularly taxa in captivity or cultivation). Thus, this list should not yet be regarded as a complete baseline of the knowledge of alien taxa present in South Africa. The checklist is presented in a manner that is tidy and FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, reusable) and will be maintained, expanded, and updated, with the aim for the list to become comprehensive and dynamic. By so doing, the checklist will allow the number and status of alien taxa to be tracked over time, informing management planning and regulatory decisions.
Data Records
The data in this checklist resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 1,092 records.
1 extension data tables also exist. An extension record supplies extra information about a core record. The number of records in each extension data table is illustrated below.
This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.
Versions
The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.
How to cite
Researchers should cite this work as follows:
SANBI and CIB. 2023, ‘Metadata for the list of alien species in South Africa’, In: Zengeya, T.A. & Wilson, J.R. (eds), The status of biological invasions and their management in South Africa in 2022, South African National Biodiversity Institute, Kirstenbosch and DSI-NRF Centre of Excellence for Invasion Biology, Stellenbosch. http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8217211
Rights
Researchers should respect the following rights statement:
The publisher and rights holder of this work is South African National Biodiversity Institute. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License.
GBIF Registration
This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: 78ee0f56-267b-49e1-8afc-19f03cf81276. South African National Biodiversity Institute publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by South African Biodiversity Information Facility.
Keywords
Alien species; biological invasions; invasive species; invasives; non-native species; species lists
Contacts
- Metadata Provider ●
- Author ●
- Originator ●
- Point Of Contact
- Author ●
- Originator
- Author ●
- Originator
Geographic Coverage
South Africa and inshore islands.
| Bounding Coordinates | South West [-90, -180], North East [90, 180] |
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Taxonomic Coverage
The list covers taxa from six kingdoms: Animalia, Bacteria, Chromista, Fungi, Plants and Protozoa, ,
| Species | Oreochromis niloticus |
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Temporal Coverage
| Living Time Period | Sources published or available up to 31 December 2022, with sources dating from 1906 |
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Project Data
The South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) is mandated by regulations under the National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act (Act 10 of 2004) to monitor and report on the status of biological invasions and their management in South Africa every three years. To date, three reports have been produced, in 2017, 2020 and 2023 (see http://iasreport.sanbi.org.za), and a fourth is in preparation. These reports required a consolidated national list of alien species in South Africa. Information on alien species present in a country, their status (establishment, distribution, impacts), and how they entered and move around the country is crucial for their effective management. Such information underpins regulations, allocation of management resources, and evaluations of current and future threats.
| Title | The status report of biological invasions and their management in South Africa |
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| Funding | South African Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) and B-Cubed project (Biodiversity Building Blocks for policy) which is funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Programme (ID No 101059592). |
| Study Area Description | South Africa and inshore islands |
| Design Description | See notes on project description |
The personnel involved in the project:
- Author
- Author
- Author
- Author
Sampling Methods
Data were extracted from various sources and merged based on standardised taxonomy. The processes followed are documented and described in Zengeya et al. 2025
| Study Extent | The species list of alien taxa in South Africa was developed as part of triennial national status reports on biological invasions. The study extent is Mainland South Africa and inshore islands. The period of study includes data sources published between 1906 and 31 December 2022 |
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| Quality Control | The data were systematically curated with metadata that provide details of what information is contained in each column, and what the different levels in each column mean. The process to check taxonomic information was automated. The nomenclature of non-plant taxa was checked against the Global Biodiversity Information Facility taxonomic backbone. For plant taxa, the nomenclature was first checked against the Plants of Southern Africa database and the Plants of the World Online database. The International Plant Name Index, Nemaplex and the Word Register of Marine Species was also used to check data. |
Method step description:
- See workflows in Zengeya et al. 2025
Bibliographic Citations
- Wilson, J.R.U. & Kumschick, S., 2024, 'The regulation of alien species in South Africa', South African Journal of Science, 120. https://doi.org/10.17159/sajs.2024/17002
- Zengeya TA, Faulkner KT, Mtileni MP, Fernandez Winzer L, Kumschick S, McCulloch-Jones EJ, Miza-Tshangana SA, Robinson TB, Sifuba A, Engelbrecht W, van Wilgen BW, Wilson JRU (2025) A checklist of alien taxa for South Africa. bioRxiv 2025.05.22.655507. https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.05.22.655507
- Nelufule T, Robertson MP, Wilson JRU, Faulkner KT (2022) Native-alien populations—An apparent oxymoron that requires specific conservation attention. NeoBiota 74: 57–74. https://doi.org/10.3897/neobiota.74.81671
Additional Metadata
SANBI home page: https://iasreport.sanbi.org.za Specielist metadata: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8217211 Species list: http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14937470
| Alternative Identifiers | https://ipt.sanbi.org.za/resource?r=alienplantssa2025 |
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