Informations et ressources scientifiques
sur le développement des zones arides et semi-arides

CORDIS (Service Communautaire d’Information sur la Recherche et le Développement) Commission Européenne

Titre : SAV-EO Land Degradation Neutrality : Towards an Earth Observation-based Early Warning System for Savannah Degradation

Code du projet : ID : 894403

Durée : Start date 1 January 2022 ; End date 30 April 2024

Descriptif
Covering more than half of the African continent, savannahs are home to many unique plants and animals. These extensive plains are scattered and widely spaced trees are under threat by logging, development, conversion to agriculture and overgrazing by livestock. Since reductions in the productivity of dryland savannahs have major social and political implications, the UN has sounded the alarm, making the accurate quantification of savannah degradation a high priority. The EU-funded SAV-EO project will use novel remote sensing methodologies, based on freely available optical and radar satellite data, to map and monitor the fractional woody cover over the entire southern African savannah region. It will also design a monitoring tool to identify underlying land degradation processes, such as bush encroachment and deforestation

Objectifs
Savannahs are important ecosystems that are found on almost half of the African continent. Unfortunately, they undergo massive conversions and are affected by land degradation processes leading to a decline in the ecosystem services they provide to some of the continent’s poorest and most vulnerable human populations. Reductions in the productivity of dryland savannahs have major social and political implications, and the United Nations (UN) has labelled the accurate quantification of savannah degradation as of high priority.

Monitoring the woody component of savannah land cover is, therefore, needed to enhance the understanding of broad-scale changes in savannahs & their relationship with ecosystem degradation. Over large scales, this can only be achieved in a cost-effective manner using Earth Observation (EO) technologies. The development of SAV-EO is, therefore, proposed which will employ novel remote sensing methodologies, based on thousands of freely-available optical & radar satellite data for the mapping & monitoring of fractional woody cover over the entire southern African savannah region (1,500,000km2). A monitoring tool that identifies underlying land degradation processes, such as bush encroachment & deforestation, will also be devised based on a dense time-series analysis approach using all available data from the 45-year long Landsat archive. Another objective of SAV-EO is to provide an advancement in the design of operational indicators for the assessment & monitoring of land degradation, within the Land Degradation Neutrality framework suggested by the UN, in order to achieve the target of the Sustainable Development Goals to combat desertification by the 2030.

Participants au projet
Coordinateur : THE MANCHESTER METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITY

Budget
Coût total : € 224 933,76
Contribution UE : € 224 933,76

CORDIS