Analysis of Climate Change & Food Security based on Remote Sensing & In Situ Data Sets

The following specific scientific problems were addressed:

1. To assess efficiency of using remote sensing data to yield forecasting in Ukraine at various administrative scales, and compare this approach to crop growth and meteorological models.
2. To investigate drought dynamics in Ukraine based on remote sensing and in situ data.
3. To assess long-term trends of crucial climatic parameters such as temperature and precipitation that influence agriculture production.An empirical regression model using remote sensing data to crop yield forecasting was developed, and its performance was similar to meteorological and crop growth models when producing winter wheat yield forecasts at oblast level in Ukraine 2 to 3 months prior to harvest, while providing minimum requirements to input datasets. Analysis of agriculture-related extreme events such as droughts using vegetation health index (VHI) derived from NOAA satellites data showed that there is no increasing trend in drought area for Ukraine over past 10 years although the last 50-year country average annual temperature increased to 1.45?C (twice above the global increase). Total annual precipitation increased by 40 mm offsetting drought intensification due to a warmer climate.

Collaboration between US and Ukrainian teams as well as with end users in Ukraine made possible to establish an operational framework for crop yield forecasting in Ukraine using satellite data and crop growth models. This enabled operational forecasting of winter wheat yield for Ukraine in 2012, and delivery of forecasts to the Ukrainian Hydrometeorological Center. Results of the projects could be further applied for State Ministries and Administrations and for insurance companies.

Web site of the project: http://food-security.ikd.kiev.ua/