Remote Sensing and GIS in Agriculture and Forest Resource Monitoring

Abstract

Biological land resources are highly vulnerable to variations in climate, soil and topography of different regions, and all these factors need to be analysed on spatio-temporal basis for proper management and planning. The advanced techniques like remote sensing, global positioning system (GPS) and geographic information system (GIS) can be of great use for their assessment, management and monitoring. The availability of remotely sensed data from different sensors of various platforms with a wide range of spatio-temporal, radiometric and spectral resolutions made remote sensing as, perhaps, the best source of data for large-scale applications in agriculture and forest resource monitoring. The integrated use of remotely sensed data, GPS and GIS will enable natural resource managers and researchers to develop management plans for a variety of agriculture and forest resource management applications. In the present chapter, examples of remote sensing and GIS applications in agriculture and forest resource monitoring were reviewed.