Remote sensing-based environmental assessment and monitoring - generation of operational baseline and enhanced experimental products in southern Africa

The spatial extension of the countries covered by SASSCAL, the diversity of their landscapes, and the range of social and ecological processes, constitute a challenge to environmental research. The latter have sometimes needed to focus on small test sites for very specifi c questions, or else required data and methods that allowed large area assessments. In either situation it is important that the studies are founded on consistent and comparable data. Responding to this requirement, a range of products based on operational earth observation satellite systems has been developed in the frame of SASSCAL.