“Remote-sensing satellites have changed the world as we know it – and how we know it.” After the launch of the Landsat program in the early ‘70’s, agricultural policymakers and planners soon realised that here was a tool that would revolutionize data-gathering.

Nowadays EARTH OBSERVATION is the sector probably most important in our everyday living, yet its benefits are relatively unknown to the public, who are far more aware of space in communications – TV, cellphones, IT and the Internet, ‘handheld devices’ and pocket GPS navigation.

At the IAC Symposium “Future Earth Observation Systems” (B1.2) CSIR researcher WOLFGANG LÜCK will outline novel imaging strategies for a high-resolution optical satellite in geo-stationary orbit, AFRICA-GEO-SAT1. Geo-stationary Earth Observation can cover a wide area, but at lower resolutions.

Now with the techniques being developed it will be possible to greatly increase resolution. The CSIR Satellite Applications Centre maintains and periodically refreshes a comprehensive archive of satellite remote-sensing data over the southern African continent from 3º to 50º south (as far north as Bujumbura, Burundi) to ensure that fundamental geographic information is available to regional and other African communities.

The information supplied via Earth observation provides a host of valuable inputs for decision-makers, impacting areas such as the agro-environment, food security, ocean resources, water management, disaster management and relief operations, housing and urban development, infrastructure planning and mining safety, even traffic management.

Remote-sensing techniques such as synthetic aperture radar (SAR) can provide astonishingly accurate measurements – detecting the expansion or contraction of a roof or bridge for instance, or the subsidence of the ground surface above a mine. Wolfgang Lück, who comes from a forestry science background, (the first industry to use satellite data) has a dream for the future.

He hopes that one day in the not-too distant future a rural farmer will be able to access all the available vital information on weather, planting, seed availability, water, market conditions - and receive technical assistance via SMS on their cell-phone. Earth Observation is a vital and growing sector of the space scene, and remote-sensing satellites have changed the world as we know it, and how we know it!