CARPE
Principal Investigator:

CO Investigators:
Chris Justice

Sponsor:
USAID

Time period:
2015
to
2019

Researchers:

Project Description:

NASA, along with its consortium partners the University of Maryland (UMD) and the Observatoire Satellital des Forêts d’Afrique Centrale (OSFAC), provides unique remote sensing data products, mapping and other services to support CARPE III. In particular, NASA is focused on the deployment of the satellite based land cover monitoring techniques developed under previous phases of CARPE which will allow regional and national institutions to “leap-frog” ahead in their capacity to produce remote sensing derived land cover monitoring products and associated carbon inventory and emissions estimates. The primary focus of the NASA consortium has been and will continue to be satellite based forest cover monitoring at regional and national scales for Central Africa. Due to the large scale of  the Congo Basin, satellite based regional forest cover mapping is the only way to effectively monitor forest cover change, a critical parameter in evaluating CARPE's progress towards achieving sustainable management of targeted forested landscapes. The consortium will implement a probability based error assessment of its land cover and change products using very high resolution data. In addition the consortium proposes to incorporate other data sets with land cover data to create new, value added products to support USAID’s development objectives in Central Africa. The NASA consortium will continue to strive to establish operational satellite based forest cover monitoring in the region, primarily through its consortium partner, OSFAC, but also at government and educational institutions where possible. UMD will continue to support the CARPE website and webservices including CARPE Mapper and the Information Management Tool. In addition, the consortium proposes to support Internews Earth Journalism Network to build an environmental news and data portal for Central Africa. Finally, the NASA consortium will continue to archive and disseminate satellite data in support of CARPE partners.

Website: carpe.umd.edu
Interactive map viewer: https://carpe.umd.edu/carpemaps


Related Publications: