The European Space Agency pilots user-friendly cloud platform on food security

The European Space Agency (ESA) pilots cloud-based user-friendly Food Security Thematic Exploitation Platform (TEP) in Tanzania and Zambia. The pilot demonstrates tailored services on agriculture and aquaculture that supports informed decision making on food security. The pilot on crop monitoring and yield prediction service was implemented in Zambia, the pilot service for aquaculture is implemented for the coastal regions of Tanzania. 

The Food Security TEP is easy to use platform offering direct access to key satellite products and derived data. The platform gives access to tools for computing basic vegetation and water content indices from Sentinel-2 data, as well as chlorophyll, soil and red edge indices. Food Security TEP is an easy way of calculating indices with Earth Observation (EO) software. The platform avails templates to calculate user-defined indices using EO software packages. 

Food Security TEP also provides high-accuracy and quality checked biophysical parameters that are suitable for use in operational scenarios as well as high-quality Sentinel-2 Bottom-of-Atmosphere (BoA) reflectance products as input for user-developed services. EO products for pilot regions are available on the platform and can be discovered using the Food Security TEP Analyst. EO products for other regions and periods can be provided upon request. 

The platform offers public processing services that provide quality checked parameters available since mid of 2019. The Food Security Thematic Exploitation Platform is developed and managed by a team of research institutes and companies receiving funding from the European Space Agency (ESA). The platform is currently providing pre-operational services to its users. Users of the Food Security TEP during the pre-operational phase are referred to as ‘Early Adopters’. ESA will sponsor early adopters for conducting their initial projects. 

Food Security TEP is an opportunity for the EO industry. The African Union-led EO Programme, the GMES and Africa uses EO satellite-derived services for monitoring the coastal, marine and land-based resources of Africa. The Programme is being implemented in five regions of Africa by 13 consortia of African institutions. 

The GMES and Africa programme encourages EO stakeholders to make benefit out of this platform.

For more information
The Food Security TEP Early Adopter Program
Service Pilots
The GMES and Africa Programme