Land cover and land use information is a vital source of information for governments, agencies and institutions of a country to make informed decisions, promote sustainable development, protect the environment, food security biodiversity conservation, climate change and ensure the well-being of their citizens. It plays a critical role in shaping policies and actions that align with long-term sustainability goals.

The Government of the Gambia has committed to a stronger agricultural performance since the democratic transition and has asked International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) to co-finance the Resilience of Organizations for Transformative Smallholder Agriculture Project (ROOTS). In addition, the Government has stressed the need to capitalize on the gains of the closed IFAD-funded National Agricultural Land and Water Management Development (NEMA) program.

The Food and Agricultural Organization of United Nations (FAO) has been providing technical support to many countries through various geospatial and remote sensing activities related to land and water monitoring, agricultural productivity and food security, agricultural information and statistics services. With this backdrop, IFAD approached FAO requesting potential technical support to the ROOTS project in support to component 1 (with specific focus on infrastructure development and management for resilient rice cultivation, vegetable cultivation, agroforestry and mangrove restoration).