GAF to Complete Forest Cover Mapping in Congo

GAF AG, Germany, has been awarded a contract through the GEOFORAFRI programme to complete the 2010 forest cover mapping of the Republic of Congo for REDD+, the initiative for equity in forest climate policy. The GEOFORAFRI programme is set up to facilitate the adoption of Earth observation techniques and ensure the methodological and technological know-how within Central and Western African countries.

Aim of this is to enable local institutions to carry out forest cover monitoring according to the international guidelines required to participate and benefit from the REDD+ mechanism. The programme supports existing forest mapping initiatives in the Congo Basin and West African countries. GAF has been mapping historic forest cover (1990-2000 and 2010) in the Republic of Congo in the context of the European Space Agency-financed GSE FM REDD extension and has thus been selected to benefit from the GEOFORAFRI initiative.

Key activities of the project include:

• Development of the reference image database: Acquisition and image pre-processing required to complete the existing database on the entire national territory and the relevant periods 

• Forest cover mapping: Finalisation of the national forest cover mapping for 1990, 2000 and 2010 according to recommended international classifications

• Forest cover change mapping: Finalizing the forest cover change mapping for the considered periods and according to recommended international classifications

• Quality control: Accuracy assessment of the obtained products

• Capacity building: Measures to ensure the involvement of technical staff of the local partner, and staff training of MRV units in the use of remotely sensed data.

Image courtesy: Landsat TM Dataset © USGS, 2001

RapidEye Dataset © RapidEye AG, 2009, provided under ESA-EC GSC-DA