The SDG 15.3.1 module on SEPAL has enabled land degradation assessments, improved monitoring of changes, supported sustainable land management, Integrated Land Use Planning, and enhanced global reporting on land degradation neutrality using advanced geospatial analysis. A scientific article on the using the module published in Land journal (link). A side event titled ‘Leveraging Space Information and Earth Intelligence - Innovative Solutions for Land Degradation Assessment and Enhanced Drought Resilience’ was co-organised with international partners at the UNCCD COP 16 on Dec 9th, 2024. SEPAL platform was one of topics of discussions in the event.

Some of its features are: 

• Methodology is based on the latest UNCCD guidelines (GPG version 2) 
• Selection of high-resolution satellite images from Sentinel 2 and Landsat program along with MODIS.
• Option to use in-country land cover dataset and nation land cover change matrix

Experiments using SEPAL for field boundary delineation in Burkina Faso, Ukraine, and Mauritania demonstrated its effectiveness in mapping agricultural plots, enhancing land management, and supporting sustainable agriculture through advanced geospatial analysis. Specific contributions include:

The Geospatial Unit has leveraged the Segment Anything Model to improve the accuracy and automation of the agricultural field boundary delineation. The model is applied to harmonized Sentinel-2 EVI time series, which the data processing chain is accessible through SEPAL, allowing the accurate delineation agricultural field boundary.

The model can be applied by utilizing the SEPAL platform and Jupyter Notebook which is allowing users to execute geospatial workflows by facilitating large-scale monitoring.

The integration of Segment Anything Model within SEPAL’s cloud infrastructure ensures that the field boundary delineation can be scaled to different regions and contexts. This scalability ensures that the approach can be used globally to contribute to food security and sustainable agriculture efforts.

The SEPAL platform has the ability to connect with libraries of land cover legends in line with international standards to ensure consistency in mapping and analysis. It supports globally recognized classification systems, enabling accurate land and agricultural monitoring, ecosystem assessments, and sustainable land management practices.

In-country experiences with SEPAL highlight its user-friendly interface, efficient geospatial processing, and support for land monitoring in various countries. In Pakistan, support is provided for land cover and crop monitoring, and other applications.