Assessment of drought impact on vegetation health using remote sensing on cloud

Droughts are natural phenomena that affect the health of crops, and owing to changes in climate, they are expected to increase in frequency. Drought has a significant impact on economic and social well-being. Recently, satellite data have emerged as one of the most powerful tools for studying the environment owing to the high availability of data. This paper presents the design and implementation of a system that uses satellite remote sensing data to analyze the impact of drought on agricultural regions. Our approach makes use of Sentinel Hub, a Cloud service that provides access to multi-spectral satellite imagery. In this study, we analyzed the correlation between vegetation health and soil moisture, which was detected using multi-spectral indices. A model was devised to study vegetation cover variations that occur over a period of time and to evaluate whether soil moisture played a role in those changes. The results of the model for a region of lai county in Romania matched the reports from local authorities. Such a system may be useful for farmers, businesses, and local authorities, who could utilize the information provided by the model to make informed decisions that can improve the overall health and performance of crops.