The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) have collaborated to make available priority geospatial layers of agro-ecological zoning from the Global Agro-Ecological Zoning version 4 (GAEZ v4) on the Global Atlas for Renewable Energy platform.

FAO’s GAEZ v4 is the most ambitious global assessment to date that comprises a large volume of spatial natural resources indicators and results of agro-ecological crop analysis, while IRENA’s Global Atlas for Renewable Energy is an online platform intended to help policymakers and investors to find renewable energy resources maps for locations across the world. As the largest ever initiative to help countries understand their renewable energy potential, the Global Atlas platform now hosts GAEZ v4 layers representing crop suitability index for 26 different crops. The addition of GAEZ v4 to the Global Atlas will help users make informed decisions on potential bioenergy production and determine a specific bioenergy pathway through the IRENA Bioenergy Simulator. 

The Bioenergy Simulator is one of the simulators developed on IRENA’s Global Atlas platform, alongside the SolarCity simulator. As a platform that shares over 2000 renewable energy maps covering solar, wind, bioenergy, geothermal and marine energy, the Global Atlas aims at closing the gap between countries that have access to the necessary data and expertise to evaluate the potential for renewable energy deployment in their countries. 

The fourth version of GAEZ, released in June 2021 by FAO in collaboration with the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), represents the agronomic backbone for various applications including the quantification of potential land productivity, providing information about the current and future agricultural production, irrigation demand and sustainable bioenergy development options. It provides critical information by crop type such as yield gap analysis in the context of climate change and preliminary assessment of the bioenergy potential within a selected area in the context of energy transition planning.

GAEZ v4 is also accessible through the GAEZ v4 Data Portal, which is an interactive data access facility enabling data visualization and providing free access to data and information. “GAEZ is a successful example of practical science and research in support of sustainable development, as well as for sustainable energy. GAEZ v4 represents decades of research and innovation, providing better information and integrating socio-economic data on incomes, livelihood, nutrition, trade and markets,” Dr Matieu Henry said. In addition, the Data Portal provides access to the GAEZ v4 methodology and supporting documentation, crops summary statistics tables, and detailed scientific metadata and document.

For more information, please contact GAEZ Team at FAO geospatial Unit, Land and Water Division (NSL): [email protected]  or Global Atlas for Renewable Energy Team at IRENA: [email protected].