FAO Experts Showcase Advances in Land and Water Management at European Space Agency Workshop on High Resolution Thermal Satellite Imagery

The European Space Agency (ESA) recently organized the International Workshop on High-Resolution Thermal Earth Observation (EO), where experts from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) shared their work in land and water management. Livia Peiser, the Technical Officer of the WaPOR project at the FAO's Land and Water Division, delivered a keynote presentation emphasizing the importance of utilizing high-resolution thermal EO data to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Peiser's presentation highlighted the significance of knowledge-driven land and water management and its role in achieving the SDGs. She underscored the value of high-resolution thermal EO data and its potential to drive advancements in sustainable agriculture and efficient water resource management. Access her keynote presentation via this link: link to presentation.

In addition to Peiser's keynote, Bert Coerver, also from FAO, presented a poster focusing on PyWaPOR, the open-access python implementation of the algorithms that allow the generation of WaPOR data. 

Through the PyWaPOR project, users gain access to the models (WaPOR-ETLook, C-Fix, and SERoot) developed by the FRAME Consortium for the WaPOR methodology. This empowers users to customize the models to their specific requirements, incorporating intermediate parameters and data from different sensors. PyWaPOR also provides a range of tools to prepare and process datasets, enabling automatic downloading, merging, and gap-filling. Notably, PyWaPOR is already being implemented in the Indus Basin in Pakistan to support improved irrigation management.

Coerver's poster presentation shed light on the crucial role of sharpened high-resolution, multi-sensor thermal data in PyWaPOR and its practical applications within FAO programs.

More information on pyWaPOR here.