GEO and Google Earth Engine announce funding for 3 G&A Consortium-led Projects

Three of the GMES & Africa projects were considered for the Google Earth Engine opportunity, despite the short time it was to prepare the required documents

[Updated 16-10-2020]

(c) NASA

In a post published last 5 December 2019 on its blog, the group on Earth Observations announced that it wanted to grant 25 projects proposals with licenses for the sustained use of Google Earth Engine - See http://gmes4africa.blogspot.com/2020/02/geo-and-google-earth-engine-announce.html  

More than 50 projects were submitted from around the globe on a range of social and environmental topics including climate monitoring, water and coastal observations, sustainable development and other key areas related to environmental protection and conservation.

Through a careful review process, the GEO-GEE programme has selected proposals from organizations and initiatives that will deliver significant impact using Earth observations and data science with respect to improved decision making. Projects with direct relevance to global policy agendas including the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, as well as ocean conservation and biodiversity preservation were encouraged and considered essential elements of the proposals.

On the 13th of July, the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) and Google Earth Engine (GEE) announced that 32 projects from 25 institutions in 22 countries will be awarded US$ 3 million towards production licenses and US$ 1 million in technical support from EO Data Science to tackle some of the world’s greatest challenges using open Earth data.  

Among the awardees are 8 projects in Africa: 3 in East Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar), 3 in West Africa (2 in Nigeria, 1 in Senegal), 1 in South Africa, and 1 in Tunisia.  Three GMES and Africa Financed Projects are among the winners and will benefit of cross fertilization: 

• The Multi-scale Flood Monitoring and Assessment Services for West Africa (MiFMASS) led by African Regional Centre for Space Science & Technology Education-English Nigeria (ARCSSTE-E).
• The Sustainable Water Management led by Observatoire du Sahara et du Sahel (OSS) for North Africa.
• The Sustainable water management for agriculture co-led by Laboratoire de Télédétection Appliquée (LTA) and Centre de Suivi Ecologique (CSE), for West Africa. 

For all the winning proposals, this marks the beginning of a two-year journey to produce tangible societal benefits using the power of Earth observations coupled to Google Earth Engine. In addition, the winners will receive in-kind technical support, mentoring and ongoing capacity development to ensure projects achieve their intended impact. 

More information on the GEO + GOOGLE EARTH Joint Initiative

• Theadora Mills | Communications Officer, GEO Secretariat | tmills@geosec.org | earthobservations.org
• Discover the GEO and Google Earth announcement and the full list of winning projects

About 

• AfriGEO: The African Group on Earth Observations.  The AfriGEO initiative, developed within the GEO framework, is to strengthen the link between the current GEO activities with existing capabilities and initiatives in Africa. 
• The Google Earth Engine Initiative is a planetary-scale platform for Earth science data & analysis that has been established by Google.