The Global Land-Cover Data Initiative

[Gloria]

Land use is of major importance in maintaining biodiversity and ecosystem services. Coordinating the monitoring of land use changes throughout the globe should help with future decisions. Big brother is here and not going away. Maybe we can extract some benefit.

United States Launches New Global Initiative to Track Changes in Land Cover and Use Data-Sharing Will Assist Land-Managers Worldwide

“The Global Land-Cover Data Initiative aims to provide land-managers, decision-makers and communities around the globe with critical information about changes to land use and land cover,” Hayes told the delegates from 85 countries and the European Commission at the intergovernmental GEO VII Ministerial Summit meeting in Beijing. “This type of sharing of data and technology can help us make wise decision about how best to build a sustainable future, protect our environment, and tackle challenges like pollution and climate change,” he said.
The 30-meter resolution will produce several land-cover data products for the international community. The first set of products will describe the Earth’s land cover conditions as of 2010,

And will include:A 2010 global land-cover characteristics baseline providing quantitative measures of six major land-cover characteristics-- percent tree, shrub, herbaceous, surface water and wetness, snow/ice, or barren land-cover. This should be completed by December 2012.
A 2010 global map of land-cover and land-use types—such as such as urban and built-up areas, agriculture, forests, grasslands, shrublands, water bodies, wetlands, snow and ice, and barren areas-- using the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization classification system. This global layer should be completed by December 2013.

Earthshots introduces remote sensing by showing examples of how environmental changes look from space.

Earthshots: Satellite Images of Environmental Change: Table of Contents