INTRODUCTION

As the globalization era progresses, societies and world economies have been transformed dramatically, mainly through increased international trade and cultural exchange. Advances in technology, major biotechnological innovations, and greater international movements of people and commodities have created a system that metaphorically unites the world into one global village; goods and services produced in one part of the world can easily be transported and made available in all parts of the globe. As much as the globalization era has created new challenges, it has also inherited many unresolved challenges of the past. How will a world, divided into over 200 sovereign countries and territories, cope with these unthinkably fast globalization processes, while preserving the environmental integrity of our planet? In particular, achieving a balance among globalization processes, the growing economy, preservation of biodiversity, protection against biosecurity threats, and safeguarding the health of the fragile ecosystem seems to be a distant dream that would be difficult to realize.

Concomitant with the emergence of the globalization era, mass mortalities have been observed over a wide range of farmed and wild aquatic animals, including fish, mollusks, crustaceans, harbor seals, manatees, turtles, frogs, coral organisms, and sea urchins (Heide-Jorgensen and Harkonen 1992; Lafferty and Kuris 1993; Moyer et al. 1993; Littler and Littler 1995; Altstatt et al. 1996; Rahimian and Thulin 1996; Jones et al. 1997; Bossart et al. 1998; Ford et al. 1999; Harvell et al. 1999; Rosenberg and Loya 2004).