March 2003

GLCF provides imagery in support of 2003 cocoa census

As with previous years, GLCF has provided crucial high-resolution imagery for the monitoring of cocoa in South America. The ability to map regional illicit crop activity has provided essential, verifiable political and policy- relevant tools. Since the inception of this program, law enforcement activities have become more efficient and have made better use of limited resources.

Providing Satellite Imagery to the Developing World

As is becoming increasingly evident, the GLCF's open data policy is benefiting members of the international research community on an increasingly large scale. The following quotes are from a doctoral student in Columbia who, were it not for GLCF, would have been unable to complete his thesis' remote sensing analysis. "...discovering the GLCF database was an amazing opportunity for my research. As a native of Colombia, I have always been limited by the satellite imagery I could get from my country, not only for the lack of coverage or relatively cloud free scenes, but also because of the price of acquiring these images." "...it was the first time I was able to obtain a multi temporal dataset to study landcover change in a specific location."

Data Reciprocity Standard Enters New Phase

Traditionally, users of online satellite data sources participate as 'consumers' and as both 'consumers' and 'providers'. In what amounts to giving back to the community, a growing number of GLCF users have freely chosen to not just download and consume data but also to share their own data and products. For example, the same user referenced in the nugget, "Providing Satellite Imagery to the Developing World", chose to reciprocate and provide GLCF with several of his own scenes. For other members of the Earth science community, this means that they will have a complete coverage of the region in question, and will be able to access scenes which were otherwise not available.