The Copernicus programme, coordinated and managed by the European Commission, delivers environmental information (largely based on Earth Observation satellite data) in the form of Copernicus Services, addressing six thematic areas: Land, Marine, Atmosphere, Climate Change, Emergency Management and Security. The new Sentinel satellites, recently extended through the successful launch of Sentinel-3, will deliver an unprecedented volume of EO data in high spatial, radiometric and temporal resolution, providing a huge potential for monitoring applications within the Land Monitoring Service - at continental and global scale. The synergistic use of Sentinel-1/2/3 opens up the possibility for new applications, such as the use of time series in the area of Land Monitoring. The ECoLaSS project (Evolution of Copernicus Land Services based on Sentinel data) aims to develop methods and algorithms for pre-operational prototypes improving and developing future specific Copernicus Land services. These prototypes, representing new or improved Copernicus Land Cover and Land Use products, will be demonstrated by means of test/demonstrations sites distributed over Europe and Africa, representing multiple bio-geographic regions and biomes. Prototypes will be designed with high spatial and thematic accuracy, in a timely manner for a pan-European operational Roll-out with the potential for global applications. ECoLaSS will promote the innovation potential of new land monitoring services and applications and might thus contribute to a growing “Copernicus Economy” by boosting (new) Copernicus CORE Land Services and value-added applications (Downstream Services). It is expected, that such new services will bring new opportunities with a wide range of dedicated applications to the market from 2020 onwards and thus significantly contribute to a positive evolution of the Copernicus Land services.

Efforts to monitor and map changes of forest areas using Earth Observation (EO) technologies to support decision making in reversing deforestation/degradation has been increasing in the past decade. This has especially gained momentum due to key developments for example in the United Nations Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) policy process related to countries reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) which requires an assessment of national historical and projected deforestation/degradation rates and statistics. The advent of the European Copernicus Programme’s Sentinel data with their high spatial resolution and revisit time at global, regional and national levels provides an unprecedented volume of data for improved forest monitoring which should be exploited by the European science and EO industry communities. The current Project aims to implement a co-ordination and consolidation of the existing European Capacity for EO based Forest Monitoring with relevant stakeholders, International Agencies, Research Community and Private Sector. A key outcome of the Project would then be a proposed framework for a Copernicus REDD+ Service which can make use of the planned Copernicus Data and Information Access Services (C-DIAS) Platform for improving EO data and product accessibility and functionality to end Users. Furthermore the identification of infrastructural and research gaps for EO Forest Monitoring on different scales (global to local) will result in the definition of future R&D Programmes addressing key gaps and priorities.

The EOMonDis Project aims to improve the operationality of tropical forest products/services in order to better access the funding for the UNFCCC REDD+ policy which is a large market segment for the EO-industry in Europe. Additionally, national forest policy programmes and Zero Deforestation programmes also require forest monitoring systems with assessment of forest/non-forest information using disturbance indicators for deforestation and degradation as well as changes in above ground woody biomass. In order to provide operational forest monitoring services for the humid and dry forests several technical challenges have to be overcome. For example, the occurrence of persistent cloud conditions in tropical regions impact the effective use of optical EO data. Seasonal effects in dry forest ecosystems (leaf-fall) combined with limited availability of multi-seasonal EO data coverages also influence the quality and cost effectiveness of the monitoring systems. These situations will change drastically with the Sentinel constellations which provide the high frequency, high resolution optical and radar data required. Therefore, the overarching goal of EOMonDis is to develop innovative and cost-effective EO-based methods to address the technical challenges for tropical forest monitoring which will also fully utilize the comprehensive information provided by the dense time series of optical and SAR satellite data of Sentinel-1 and 2. The methods developed will be tested on study sites selected to represent the wide range of variety in the tropical biomes, in Malawi, Cameroon, Gabon and Vietnam. Users from these countries will be consulted for consolidation of the service requirements, validation of the services, the customization and improvement of the services to fit into their workflows. Based on a market analysis and service validation by the User a 3year business concept will be developed to ensure that there is income generation after the project completion.