Nutria Eradication Project (Nakdong River Basin, South Korea)

Nutria (Myocastor coypus), a South American rodent introduced to Korea in the 1980s for fur and meat farming, escaped after the industry collapsed and established invasive wetland populations that damage riverbank embankments, agricultural crops and native wetland vegetation, especially along the Nakdong River basin in South Gyeongsang Province.

Following a 2013 pilot that captured 3,349 individuals, Korea's Ministry of Environment launched the national 'Nutria Eradication Project' in 2014, coordinating 18 organisations (national and local government agencies, research institutes) with roughly 95 field specialists conducting GPS-mapped surveys in spring, late autumn and winter across 42+ weeks per year. Techniques included GIS-based capture-area targeting, cage trapping along riverbank movement corridors, and a public capture-incentive scheme. Initial funding was around USD 9.5 million, with a further USD 4 million allocated in 2017 for improved detection and population-modelling technology.

Between 2014 and 2018 the programme captured 27,487 nutria (annual totals falling from 7,864 in 2014 to 1,930 in 2018), and recorded habitat tracks fell from 1,510 across 19 administrative districts (2014) to 176 across 14 districts (2018) — roughly a 54% drop between 2016 and 2017 alone. Ministry of Environment monitoring reported a 72% decline in nutria numbers in southern Korea between 2014 and 2022.

Independent academic assessment (Jo et al., published in Sustainability) cautions that nutria remain established in refuge wetlands and complete eradication has not been achieved; ongoing monitoring and control funding continue to be required, and some capture methods have drawn animal-welfare criticism from wildlife advocates.