Sentinel-2: Usage by World Food Programme WFP – World Food Programme

1. Sentinel-2: Usage by World Food Programme WFP – World Food Programme Sentinel-2 User Consultation Meeting, 25 April 2012

2. The World Food Programme WFP is one of the largest humanitarian and development agency of the UN, working in more than 80 countries The main priority of WFP is to: Provide timely and appropriate humanitarian assistance to save lives and protect livelihoods of the poor and vulnerable households against shocks and food emergencies

4. The World Food Programme • WFP assisted 96 million beneficiaries (2011) in 79 countries, wih requirements of 5.1mn MT (USD5.7bn). • Top ten countries by beneficiary numbers (2012): • Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan, Yemen, DRC, DPRK, Haiti, Somalia • About 50% of WFP beneficiaries is in Africa.

5. Agricultural Monitoring and WFP • EO data under an increasing usage at WFP with agricultural monitoring a major application. • Applications : • Early warning and impact assessment • Refinement of food assistance estimates • Support to the design of WFP food assistance interventions • Contribution to baseline Food Security surveys (climatology, zoning, history of shocks)

6. Applications of Sentinel-2 foreseen at WFP • Early Warning of drought/floods impacts on cultivated area • Key information for post-event needs assessment missions • Planning and evaluation of food assistance intervention • Weather Risk Index Insurance Schemes • Local procurement and P4P

7. Standard Analysis • Main Resources : RFE (rainfall) and NDVI (vegetation) • RFE: Key driver for crop performance – USGS, U of Reading • NDVI: Direct indicator of vegetation status – (SPOT-VGT, MODIS) • Proxy for household resources (crop and pasture production) • Fine resolution, performance over irrigated areas • Ease of access, free download data sets • Familiarity • Long historical time series (reference scenarios)

9. Other Requirements EO information must be combined with other information in order to draw conclusions about possible impacts • Land Cover : distinction between crop and non crop land. • Crop land: distinction between farming systems – irrigated vsrainfed, commercial vssubsistence • Crop calendars : varieties and length of development cycles • Household information : assessment of vulnerability

10. South Sudan early season NDVI anomaly How is this translated into information of value for WFP? Know-how of farming systems and crop calendars : Short maturing sorghum is planted early so as to yield the first grain harvest of the season. The NDVI anomaly translates into a “hunger gap” longer by 4 to 6 weeks. Impact of this has to be judged against status of household stocks, itself mostly a function of previous season’s production

11. Other Stuff

12. Afghanistan NDVI profiles over Cultivated Areas

13. Afghanistan Irrigated NDVI profiles NDVI profile analysis allows an idea of the changes in the type of irrigated farming (crop intensity) that have taken place since the preparation of the land cover.

14. Afghanistan Winter Wheat Production Estimates

15. Desired/required Parameters • Parameters: • Crop/growing season performance (NDVI, fAPAR, LAI, red edge) • Seasonal cropland masks, cultivated area estimates • Land Cover estimates • Land degradation indicators (?)

16. Issues • Regional – country scale monitoring : • Handling of very large data volumes difficult • Zoom approach from medium resolution data from VGT, MODIS, MERIS, ...? Selection of priority areas. • Frequency of clean, cloud-free imagery: • Filtering algorithms (2D/3D spline – PLS) • Reliability of cropland masks / land cover (less stringent requirements)?

17. Information for CFSAM Missions Joint FAO-WFP missions Sentinel-2 could produce key input information both providing cultivated area estimates, and determining spot areas for the field mission visits Contributions to more accurate assessment of cultivated area may be crucial input, in particular for South Sudan (Mission provides only production estimate for the country)

18. Flooded Area Estimates Sentinel-2 can provide much improved information relative to current staple of MODIS 250m Purpose : Fast estimates of affected crop land and most impacted areas – crucial for first three weeks when speed of information delivery is crucial WFP operations – destroyed roads/bridges, ID of heli landing sites Questions related to latency of operational product

19. Weather Risk Insurance WFP and IFAD collaborating on a Weather Risk Management Facilityto improve access to index-based insurance products and a range of other financial services for food security Evaluating usage of hybrid satellite and weather station products where weather station data are limited to inform weather indices Sentinel-2 : Fine scale verification of crop performance

20. Evaluation of WFP interventions Food assistance modalities include FFW and FFA, where food is provided to support improvement of community natural assets. Aims to reduce vulnerability to shocks (drought) by addressing environmental degradation MERET program in Ethiopia: Community watershed development, linking natural resource management with livelihood rehabilitation. Water harvesting, soil conservation, drainage structures, re-forestation.

21. Infiltration & recharge of water table Treatment of steepslopes for maximum water retention and infiltration effect

22. (MERET – MoA/WFP) terraces terraces Grazing land Micro-ponds Shallow wells Shallow wells

23. Evaluation of WFP interventions Role of Sentinel-2 • Planning of interventions • Monitoring and evaluation of the impacts of WFP interventions Identification of land degradation hotspots Assessment of land cover changes Land cover products, seasonal indicators

24. P4P New procurement model Still a small component within overall WFP procurement volumes, but maybe locally important Food purchases from local small scale producers Requirement : Monitoring crop performance on participating farms, in particular under forward contracting situations

25. Thank You World Food Programme Via C.G. Viola, 68/70 - 00148 Rome, Italy