Tropical deforestation and remote sensing

Abstract

Remote-sensing technologies are specially pertinent to the issue of tropical deforestation. They represent a systematized and objective mode for documentation of the rates and forms of deforestation throughout the biome. Inventorying of remaining tracts of tropical forest, together with continuous monitoring of their status, becomes all the more urgent as deforestation continues at ever-faster rates in salient sectors of the biome. The paper reviews the need for a comprehensive, concise and acceptably cheap way to accomplish the task; and it assesses the types of remote sensing available through satellite surveys, from the early Landsat technologies to the latest spot equipment. In particular, the paper appraises the more-refined and sophisticated technologies now available, which can often distinguish between different types of forest cover and between different degrees of deforestation (complete or partial). The paper concludes with a brief assessment of a ‘targetted’ approach, directed at critical locations where deforestation is proceeding most rapidly and where immediate management responses are most critical.