On March 10, 2021, took place a kick-off meeting of «High-Impact Hot Spots of Land Cover Land Use Change: Ukraine and Neighboring Countries» project within Land Cover/ Land Use Change program led by Dr. Sergii Skakun, Assistant Professor in the Department of Geographical Sciences and iSchool, University of Meryland. Funding is provided by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
The meeting was attended by representatives of GEOG researchers, Ukrainian Space Research Institute and National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute”. The results of previous and current projects, which will be the basis for further research, were discussed, as well as the strategy of the proposal was defined, namely: (1) preparation and data collection; (2) developing methods for merging satellite data with multiple sources for identification and quantification LCLUC; (3) generation and validation of LCLUC maps for “hotspots” at moderate and very high spatial resolution; (4) analysis and quantification of LCLUC and its impact on certain areas of human activity (military conflict, crop rotations, unregistered lands, open burning); (5) demonstration of the stability of the developed methods.
More about the project: https://geog.umd.edu/feature/sergii-skakun-receives-nasa-grant-analyze-high-impact-hot-spots-land-cover-land-use-change