National Earth Observation Conference 2018

National Earth Observation Conference 2018 (Day 3)

6th September 2018 University of Birmingham
RSPsoc, National Centre for Earth Observation and Centre for EO Instrumentation

Conference Poster downloaded from here

The National Earth Observation Conference (NEOcon) 2018 is the largest Earth Observation (EO) conference held annually within the U.K. held by the Remote Sensing and Photogrammetry Society (RSPsoc). This year the event was held by the University of Birmingham and I attended the third day of the conference to visit sessions which were related to the ways in which EO can be used to assist with governments in a general capacity, as well as the uses of EO technology specifically for development assistance.

Over the course of the day I attended a number of sessions which looked at the benefits of EO data for government applications and by extension development assistance, many of the projects presented in the latter session were funded by the UK Space Agency's International Partnerships Programme (IPP). As part of this session, Prof. Giles Foody presented a detailed review of Rights Lab's (University of Nottingham) work regarding the use remotely sensed data in order to end modern slavery by 2030, on behalf of the project lead Dr. Doreen Boyd.

The two sessions were exploring similar themes but from two very different angles - the use of 'EO for Government' session was very much focused on the UK government's use of remote sensing technologies, whereas the 'EO for Development Assistance' session looked at the applications which can be deployed sustainably as part of development assistance on behalf of the UK government and their funding or by other research and funding methods. Much of the development work was based in overseas territories, or saw the researchers working in large teams partnered with local governments and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) within the countries in which the research projects were occurring. These contrasts were stark and demonstrated the variety of applications for EO data and technology across the UK government with varying degrees of funding, open access and data collection programmes.

EO for Government

Within the EO for Government session, the presentations were focused on the practical use of geospatial data for the applications which support UK government departments in order to efficiently monitor the country using satellite imagery, LiDAR mapping amongst other resources.

One of the most interesting parts of this session was the exploration of the EO sector and how the acquisition and application of remotely sensed imagery can be improved in the future. London Economics conducted an investigation regarding the efficient use of these resources and how the geospatial sector can utilise EO data for nine specific sectors within the UK. This was included in the ‘Value of satellite-derived Earth Observation capabilities to the UK Government today and by 2020’ report (Sadlier et al. 2018). The report concludes as follows:

·    The total value to satellite-derived EO for government applications is an estimated £943 million (for current use) expected to increase to £1248 million by 2020 (p. 48).

·    The government has the potential to use EO technologies for not just agriculture, flooding, maritime, meteorology and forestry (as at present) but also for research and applications regarding the atmosphere, the built environment, coastal environments and transport. 

·    EO can enhance public service delivery as potential risks mount and department resources shrink (p. 49).

·    UK government use of EO is estimated to support approximately £10 million in commercial revenue and £3 million in grant-funded projects (p.50).

·    The study should repeated after the 2020 cycle to also account for the effects of Brexit and the changes implemented after this report cycle.

The recommendations raised within the London Economics report are also very relevant to the newly formed Geospatial Commission (announced in a press release in November 2017) which is assessing the government’s use of geospatial technologies as part of the National Geospatial Strategy. This includes such tasks as how to utilise the EO stock that is already owned and how to make acquisition, processing and utilisation of the data for applications more efficient in the future across all government departments. As part of this Captain Martin Jones (UK Government Observation Service, Geospatial Commission) made a call for evidence (HM Government 2018 – which you can access here) for people working with data derived from EO technologies regarding their needs, views and hopes for the future of government policy relating to remotely sensed data.

You can find out more information about the Geospatial Commission's call for evidence here. 

Personally, one of the key concerns is the access to data going forward with the current global-political climate (for example the current re-evaluation of Landsat data). There were a number of presentations throughout the conference which stressed the value of the access to open access to data, such is the policy with the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Copernicus programme regarding access to the data collected by the new Sentinel constellation. In fact the keynote on the morning of Day 3, provided by Prof. Tim Wright (University of Leeds) even stressed the need for ‘...trans-national, sustained investments in satellites, ground and people'. This is where I believe reports such as those conducted by London Economics and hopefully any concerns for future access to satellite data will noted in the call for evidence as there should be no issue with regards to the access of Copernicus data in the future, but this cannot be said for future developments of EO technology and this should be fully addressed.

EO for Development Assistance

The research presented within the ‘EO for Development Assistance’ session was more illuminating and addressed a very broad range of applications of remote sensing technologies in order to help tackle issues around the world. From investigating modern slavery to mapping dengue fever, and assessing natural hazard damage in the Caribbean to asparagus farming in Peru the scale and reach of the projects presented within this session were impressive. Several of the projects had backing from the UK Space Agency’s IPP funding, however there were other transdisciplinary projects which demonstrated the breadth and depth of remote sensing applications to support sustainable development and tackle specific issues, some of which referred to the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Prof. Giles Foody (School of Geography, University of Nottingham) was presenting the Rights Lab research assessing how the interdisciplinary research group is using EO technology to tackle the SDG target 8.7 (to end modern slavery by 2030 and all forms of child labour by 2025). As part of the research group working on the project I was already aware of the findings that we have so far and the future of the project, but it was interesting to see how our research goals were complimented by other projects looking at different topics but which all aim to achieve something very significant for the world.

Giles Foody presenting work from the Rights Lab project 'Slavery from Space'

The presentation by the Rights Lab touched upon the different industries which are being assessed via remotely sensed imagery, such as the South Asian brick manufacturing industry (Boyd et al. 2018) and fish-processing camps in Bangladesh (Bales 2016; McGoogan and Rashid 2016), among others. Moreover, the use of open access imagery and software such as Google Earth were discussed as well as the deployment of machine learning techniques and crowdsourcing methodologies. Coming at the issue of modern slavery from all angles by applying a long-standing data source is enabling modern slavery to be looked at in a whole new light.

There was a very positive response to our research, and all other projects which were explored during the ‘Development Assistance’ session. It was encouraging to see how many uses EO data can be applied to successfully and how many can actually have a tangible impact on people's lives. These practical demonstrations can support new avenues of thinking within fields which may not have considered the application of EO data as a source of information before, and this can only be considered a good thing. 

Concluding Remarks

Overall, my day at NEOcon proved to be very fruitful; gaining knowledge relating to the variety of multidisciplinary and multi-stakeholder work that is being undertaken across the globe about to numerous development challenges, as well as meeting others with a passion for improving conditions around the world through the application of remotely sensed data. 

References

Bales, K. (2016). Blood and Earth: Modern Slavery, Ecocide and the Secret to Saving the World. Spiegel & Grau, New York.

Boyd, D.S., Jackson, B., Wardlaw, J., Foody, G.M., Marsh, S. and Bales, K. (2018). Slavery from Space: Demonstrating the role for satellite remote sensing to inform evidence-based action related to UN SDG number 8. ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing,

HM Government. (2018). National Geospatial Strategy – call for evidence.

McGoogan, C. and Rashid, M. (2016). Satellites reveal ‘child slave camps’ in UNESCO-protected park in Bangladesh. The Telegraph. Available at https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/10/23/satellites-reveal-child-slave-camps-in-unesco-protected-park-in/ (Accessed 10.09.2018).

Sadlier, G., Flytjjaer, R., Sabri, F. and Robin, N. (2018). Value of satellite-derived Earth Observation capabilities to to the UK Government today and by 2020. London Economics, London.