2024 AOGEO Statement
3rd – 5th September, 2024
The 16th Asia-Oceania Group on Earth Observations (AOGEO) Symposium was held inTokyo, Japan from the 3rd to 5th September 2024. The Symposium was hosted by the
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology-Japan (MEXT) withsupport from the GEO Secretariat and brought together 294 participants and 24
countries in total.
Earth observation plays a key role in enabling a more resilient future and the AOGEO
Symposium serves as a crucial platform, bringing together experts and stakeholders
from various countries in the Asia Oceania region. It promotes the exchange ofknowledge and best practices, which, in turn, enhance the capabilities of Earthobservation technologies.
This is the first time the Asia Oceania community has convened since the adoption of
the GEO Post-2025 Strategy in November 2023. As the new Strategy emphasizes thetheme of “Earth Intelligence for All,” this Symposium was designed with the theme of“Creating Earth Intelligence with the Asia Oceania Society” to align with and develop the
Implementation Plan to execute the new Strategy in the context of the Asia Oceania
region.
To highlight the theme of “Earth Intelligence for All”, this Symposium began with an
introduction to the new Strategy and the process of developing the Post-2025 Strategy
Implementation Plan. The challenges that require the creation of Earth Intelligence (EI)
were identified, discussed, and summarized through the GEO Members’ country reports,
Special Sessions, meetings of thematic Task Groups (TGs) and their respective outcome
reports.
I.

Key Discussions and Findings

Co-creating Earth Intelligence for addressing challenges - Findings from Special Session
11.

The session stressed the importance of identifying the needs of countries and users
to utilize EI to address regional challenges and of creating and widely sharing
successful practices to prevent, address and mitigate disaster risk. Countries often
still lack basic infrastructure and data coverage, which can be only partiallyaddressed with satellite or remote sensing data.
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2.

There is a need to develop and strengthen collaborative relationships in the AOGEO
and the broader GEO community, through scaling up existing GEO activities thattarget specific countries’ and users’ needs.
The significance of EI-based solutions to contribute to national efforts to establish

3.

multi-hazards early warning systems was recognized, in the context of international
initiatives, notably the Early Warnings for All (EW4All), in the Asia Oceania region.
This should consider shifting emphasis from prediction to impact, for example,“from what the weather will be, to what the weather will do”.

Engagement of Early-Careers and Policy Impact - Findings from Special Session 24.

We recognize the significance of the diversity of the Earth observation community,
especially the involvement of younger generations in creating EI.

5.

We share the importance and potential of EI from the perspective of young
generations.

6.

We need to nurture the young generations in order to gain fresh perspectives and toinherit experience and expertise to support the development of EI (including Earthobservations) in response to rapid environmental and societal changes including
disaster risk.

Task Group Achievements, Ongoing Issues and Future Directions for Post-2025
7.

Each thematic TG held sectorial meetings and reaffirmed the significant strides they
have made in advancing Earth observations. Their achievements not only exemplify
scientific progress but also pave the way for societal applications. We outline theirachievements, ongoing issues and objectives for post 2025, emphasizing
collaboration with regional societies to foster the creation of EI (refer to Annex).
i.

Asian Water Cycle Initiative (AWCI), since 2005, has developed key functions ofdata archiving, data and model integration, early warning, climate change
impact assessment, and water-food-energy nexus in collaboration with its
member countries based on the Data Integration and Analysis System (DIAS).
AWCI has also promoted cross-sectoral coordination by supporting the2"Platform on Water Resilience and Disasters (Platform)" activities. Based on its
experience, AWCI will further expand the scope of the cross-cutting andconsolidated Platform and promote transdisciplinary collaboration amongwater-related disaster risk reduction, sanitation, poverty, health, and peace toachieve resilience, sustainability, and inclusiveness.
ii.

Asia-Pacific Biodiversity Observation Network (APBON) will continue collective
efforts to create Earth Intelligence to contribute to global goals and targets suchas SDGs and the CBD Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. APBON
further acts as a platform for improving data accessibility at regional andnational levels for a comprehensive assessment of the state and trend of
biodiversity, planning of effective conservation measures, and facilitating
effective science-policy dialogue.

iii.

Asia-Oceania Greenhouse Gas Initiative (AO-GHG) harmonizes various
observation platforms for GHGs, toward reducing uncertainties in sources andsinks, and cooperates among relevant institutes/agencies to support reporting
GHG budgets for the Global Stocktake of the Paris Agreement.

iv.

Oceans, Coasts, and Islands (OCI) has adopted a new strategy to develop a new
Earth observation-based platform to address pressing environmental issues in
Asian coastal oceans. This platform, known as the Asia Coastal Ocean Portal (ACOP), will provide accessible and usable Earth observation data and information
to support sustainable development. To achieve this, OCI is focusing on researchand development of models and algorithms for monitoring and assessing
biogeophysical variables. By integrating these tools into the A-COP, OCI aims toprovide near-real-time monitoring capabilities and contribute to addressing
ongoing environmental issues in the coastal oceans.

v.

Agriculture and Food Security (Asia-RiCE) successfully provided earth
observation to monitor rice and provide agro-meteorological information. Thereis a need for research on rice water management, damage assessment, and yield
estimation, especially with respect to capacity building of early career
researchers.

vi.

Environmental Monitoring and Protection (EMP) developed the Multi-source
Synergized Quantitative Remote Sensing Production System (MuSyQ) and3

advocated Analysis-Ready Open Data. The first 16m global LULC and the
Essential Environmental Variables (EEV) products have been generated from the
Chinese satellite (GF1/6) data. An integrated Asia-Oceania Environmental
Monitoring platform (AOEM) has been established to serve for the regionalcountries, such as the Cambodia and Pakistan. EMP will explore the cutting-edge
technologies such as EI, to continuously improve the EEVs products qualities,
and enhance the regional countries’decision-making capabilities to better serve
climate change responses, biodiversity conservation and environmental quality
governance.
II.

Conclusion

8.

The discussions at this Symposium reaffirm the necessity of creating user-driven,interdisciplinary, integrated, inclusive and innovative EI, extending beyond Earthobservations to address the diverse challenges in the Asia Oceania region. We havecommitted to leveraging the expertise accumulated for the creation of EI and its
application in solving regional challenges effectively.

9.

Expanding the Earth observation community to incorporate diverse perspectives,
including experts in early career stages, is essential for the successful creation andutilization of EI.

10. Addressing regional challenges, which are closely linked to the multiple global
environmental crises such as disaster risk, requires enhanced collaboration between
the regional AOGEO community, the global GEO community, and other internationalframeworks. This collective effort is crucial for effectively addressing thesechallenges through the development of EI, such as the Early Warnings for All
initiative.
III. Recommendations from the AOGEO community
11. Inspire ownership of GEO Member countries and engage them to contribute todeveloping the GEO Post-2025 Strategy Implementation Plan, with a focus on
enabling the GEO community to collect, validate, process and curate reliable Earthobservation data and other information to provide action-ready EI for all.
12. In doing so, emphasize human-centric and community-centric approaches to4

address the specific regional challenges through localized EI-based solutions.
13. Also, recognize the roles of the Regional GEOs and facilitate liaison among them inorder to streamline the regional activities and incorporate them into the new GEO
Work Programme.
14. Catalyze Earth Observation communities in identifying needs and challenges toutilize EI, supporting the development of policies regarding EI, and implementing
appropriate EI-based solutions.
IV. Way forward
15. We reaffirm AOGEO’s vision and the need for continuous efforts to achieve asustainable and resilient Asia Oceania region underpinned by Earth observation and
EI. We resolve to continue working together to tackle the challenges outlined in thisStatement.
16. Finally, we express our gratitude to all participants and organizers for dedicating
resources, time, and expertise to a successful Symposium and eagerly anticipate ournext gathering.

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AnnexAchievements, Ongoing Issues and Way Forward for Post-2025
AOGEO Task Groups
1. TG1 Asian Water Cycle Initiative (AWCI)
Achievements
Asian Water Cycle Initiative (AWCI) has continued to advocate the importance ofdeveloping the "Online Synthesis System for Sustainability and Resilience (OSSSR)", fostering "Facilitators", and accelerating the "End-to-End Approach" basedon the activities of the "Platform on Water Resilience and Disasters (Platform)",such as in the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia. These key directions havebeen fully endorsed at a series of globally important events related to water
management, including the 4th Asia-Pacific Water Summit held in Kumamoto in
April 2022, the 9th International Conference on Flood Management (ICFM9) heldin Tsukuba in February 2023, the UN Water Conference held in New York in
March 2023, and the 10th World Water Forum and the Bandung Spirit Water
Summit held as part of the Forum in Bali in May 2024. Accordingly, the Platform
initiatives have been adopted in the UN Water Action Agenda as the "Water Cycle
Integrator (WCI)", which integrates knowledge, capacities, and processes related
to water management.
Ongoing Issues
AWCI has deployed activities of the Platform on Water Resilience and Disasters
to other areas in the country and has ripple effects on other countries; Thailand
has officially launched the Platform, Vietnam is moving forward with establishing
the Platform, and Pakistan is starting the discussion to renew suspended efforts.
Through the activities on the OSS-SR development and Facilitator fostering, thePlatforms have reaffirmed the importance of;-local ground data for bias correction of global datasets and satellite data-

filling the gap between scientific approach and real-world socio-economic
issues-generating ownership of multi-stakeholders and local communities,
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including young generation and Indigenous people, for the social disaster risk
reduction-

value chains of actionable insights in the water-food-energy nexus andevidence-informed decisions in water disaster risk management.

Way forward for post-2025
Through DIAS, AWCI will advance the activities it has undertaken since its
inception in 2005, including data archiving, data and model integration, early
warning, climate change impact assessment, and the water-food-energy nexus.
To achieve resilience, sustainability, and inclusiveness, AWCI will further
accelerate the implementation of WCI with Earth Intelligence in the cross-cutting
and consolidated Platforms. As the future objective, AWCI will evolve its scope
to collaborate with sanitation, poverty, health, and peace, as highlighted in the
Bandung Spirits Water Summit. The innovation brought by locally implemented
Earth Intelligence will contribute to future prosperity by creating value chainsthat make ordinary and extraordinary seamless.

2. TG2 Asia-Pacific Biodiversity Observation Network (APBON)
Achievements
The Asia-Pacific Biodiversity Observation Network (APBON) is continuing its
cooperation in capacity building, and data and knowledge sharing through a
webinar series and workshops. APBON has assessed gaps and needs forbiodiversity data and knowledge throughout the region to meet therequirements of the Convention of Biological Diversity Kunming-Montreal
Global Biodiversity Framework and other relevant assessments. Noteworthy
national activities include restarting the Japan BON, publication of biodiversity
data (ASEAN, Thailand), intensive monitoring of fish in the Mekong and Tonle
Sap Rivers (Cambodia), and a census on biodiversity data across the AP region.
Ongoing Issues
APBON continues to assess needs and accessibility for data obtained by local andnational biodiversity observation networks. APBON is planning to develop
Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs) for national and regional scales by7

combining existing in-situ data with satellite data and species distribution
models, but EBVs are still challenging for APBON due to lack of accessibility of
in-situ data. Another key challenge is aligning APBON’s activities with the
National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs) in each country toenhance cooperation between science and policy for biodiversity conservation.
Further coordination should be pursued through engagement activities of
APBON, national BONs, and AOGEO, and other relevant communities globally.
Way forward for post-2025
Improving data accessibility at regional and national levels will be fundamental
for a comprehensive assessment of the state of biodiversity, planning ofeffective conservation measures, and development of effective NBSAPs.
Development of science and policy cooperation is a high priority in our region,
as our countries contain many biodiversity hotspots impacted by rapid changes
in climate, biodiversity, and society. APBON further acts as a platform for suchcooperation in the region and collaborates with GEOBON and GEO community
for harmonized actions to be taken at all scales.

3. TG3 Asia-Oceania Greenhouse Gas Initiative (AO-GHG)

Achievements
AO-GHG developed a multi-data integration system, harmonizing the increasing
number of platforms, such as remote sensing, in-situ observations, andinventories, toward reducing uncertainties in GHG sources and sinks to support
the ultimate goal of reaching net zero emission required by Paris Agreement. In
particular, GHG observation satellites have been advanced to meet therequirement of accounting GHG budgets, and Earth observation satellites withhigh spatial resolution sensors and microwave sensors have improved carbon
flux and stock estimations. Synthesis of multiple models and methods wereadvanced to obtain robust GHG budget estimation.
Ongoing Issues
AO-GHG has the following issues to achieve better estimation of greenhouse gasbalances to meet the requirement of accounting GHG budgets, (1) improved
accuracy and data availability of satellite-based GHG measurements, (2)8requirement of high spatial and temporal resolution satellite-sensors to identify
point sources of GHG and hotspot of GHG budget changes, (3) refined separationof anthropogenic and natural carbon cycle processes, (4) coordination amongagencies, (5) refinement of integration system, (6) low latency of in-situ
measurements, (7) identification of key regions in Asia-Oceania.
Way forward for post-2025
AO-GHG will further refine the multi-data integration system, and harmonize theincreasing number of platforms, such as remote sensing, in-situ observations,and inventories, to reduce uncertainties in the sources and sinks to support theultimate goal of reaching net zero emission required by Paris Agreement. The
system will be advanced to provide near-real time regional GHGs budgets andits changes not only to contribute the Global Stocktake Process, but also to
identify hotspots of GHG sink and source for emission management purposes.
Coordination across organizations, such as IPCC-TFI (Task Force on national GHG
Inventory), WMO-Global Greenhouse Gas Watch (G3W) and CEOS-ACVC, arehighly expected.

4. TG4 Oceans, Coasts, and Islands (OCI)
Achievements
In line with the adopted Post-2025 GEO Strategy, OCI (hereafter TG4) has
successfully adopted a new strategy. This involves transitioning into the activities
and development of a new Earth Observation (EO)-based platform. This platform
is designed to provide timely, sustainable, accessible, and usable EO data andinformation. The goal is to serve not only researchers but also society andstakeholders in addressing regional emerging issues and supporting sustainable
development. Particularly, TG4 has begun to develop a satellite remote sensingbased Asia Coastal Ocean Portal (A-COP) for observing and monitoring emerging
issues in Asian coastal oceans.
Ongoing Issues
Climate change and human activities are putting significant pressure on Asian
coastal oceans, leading to numerous ongoing environmental issues. These issues
9include coastal water eutrophication, hypoxia, red tide outbreaks, marine plastic
debris accumulation, ocean acidification, coral reef bleaching, and sea level rise.
Global warming and population growth are expected to worsen these problems.
Monitoring the changes in these variables is urgent, but conventional in-situ
methods are expensive and have limited spatial and temporal coverage.
Therefore, the development of a near-real-time EO-based monitoring system isbeing initiated as a new platform and core activity of TG4.
Way forward for post-2025
TG4 has started new activities to build a new EO-based platform as a new tool toprovide accessible and usable EO data and information. The new strategy
primarily consists of research and development of the A-COP, the prototype of
which will be launched within the 2024 fiscal year. In line with the Post-2025 GEO
Strategy, TG4 will reorient research activities to focus on the construction ofmodels and algorithms to produce and assess the aforementioned
biogeophysical variables. The constructed models and algorithms will then be
introduced into the A-COP. Model/algorithm development, A-COP improvement,
and implementation to gain socioeconomic benefits will be the way forward forpost-2025.
5. TG5 Agriculture and Food Security (Asia-RiCE)
Achievements(1) Rice monitoring in Asia-Oceania region:
Implement platforms for sharing of open data with standard format such as CEOS
ARD and tools is being established in Asia-RiCE, contributing to improved
agricultural statistics, agricultural policy making and beyond.
(2) Multilateral network for agro-meteorological info and rice monitoring
Provision improved agromet information and rice crop monitoring to Asia Ocean
region and promote regional cooperation on data and information sharing using
available platform and knowledge sharing.

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Ongoing Issues(1) Provide earth intelligence using EO data with ground based data including
automatic measurement by IoT for Asia Rice mentioned in above 1 and also
following two topics.
(2) Satellite based water monitoring in paddy fields - CH4Rice:
Need to study water management of rice field using remote sensing and groundbase data with AWD to reduce methane emission (CH4) from paddy fields(3) Yield estimation and damage assessment:
Need to assess damages caused by climate change including floods, droughts,
salinity intrusion, subsidence… and rice yield estimation and forecasting by
integrating remote sensing and crop model with weather projections(4) Derive adaptation and mitigation measures for stakeholders
Way forward for post-2025
To discuss EO for food security and climate adaptation/mitigation in Asia-Oceania
region with
(1) Ongoing issues described in above 2 with define international guidelines,
especially for carbon trading regarding methane emission from paddy fields(2) Strengthen cross comparison on between different countries and sharing
methodologies and validation results(3) Promote collaboration with various stakeholders both public and private
sectors for the operational use of these achievements(4) Promote continue capacity building and field survey using available funds suchas international donor and government etc.

6. TG7 Environmental Monitoring and Protection (EMP)
Achievements-

Algorithms and products: Some basic products from remote sensing at
national scale and global scale have been produced by using the Chinese
satellite data, such as land cover and vegetation parameters, NPP, FVC, LAI,NDVI, etc.
11-National reports: A collection of national report have been published basedon these products, i.e. Integrated Remote Sensing Monitoring of Ecosystems
in Chinese, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand.

-

Platform: Asia-Oceania Environmental Monitoring Platform (AOEM), which
can monitor the ecological quality, forest resources, unban expansion and air
quality in AO regions, and also release the monitoring reports and products.

-

Application and cooperation: A great deal of ecosystem researches have been
done under TG7, such as the air quality in Malaysia, heat wave, climatechange and deforestation monitoring in Pakistan, the mangrove mapping in
Thailand, flood and city monitoring in Bangladesh, forest change anddetection in Cambodia, Global environmental changes and human activity inmajor deserts, and so on.
Ongoing Issues
The capability, in-situ measurements, and the common products from remotesensing are the basis for earth intelligence. The national reports will become atemplate that we are trying to make it as a routine job and we hope it will begood for the members of AOGEO and GEO. A comprehensive platform areencouraged to incorporate the field data from different members as a third
validation of basic products and make these products more convincing.
Furthermore, more cooperations are expected through the platform of AOGEO
to gather more end users, scientists, and engineers. Many demands for remotesensing and common products have been raised and further cooperation underthe AOGEO framework have been expected. Securing adequate resources andfunding to support ongoing efforts and technological advancements ischallenging.
Way forward for post-2025
Enhancing stakeholder engagement and coordination among governments,
scientists, and local communities is vital for comprehensive monitoring.
Additionally, addressing regional variability to meet specific local needs while12maintaining a global perspective is necessary for effective environmental
protection. As we look ahead to the Post-2025, it is crucial to advance thedevelopment of a comprehensive GEO Implementation Plan that enhances ourcapabilities to collect, curate, and validate Earth Observation data. This planshould focus on delivering actionable Environmental Intelligence (EI) that caneffectively support decision-making processes. Emphasizing human-control andcommunity-focused approaches will be essential for addressing regional
challenges more precisely and equitably. Strengthening the collaboration among
regional GEOs will play a key role in ensuring that national GEOs are wellsupported in identifying and meeting their specific needs. Effective
communication and coordination among these entities will foster a more
integrated and responsive global GEO network. By prioritizing these strategies,
we can ensure that the GEO framework remains robust and adaptive, ready tomeet the evolving demands of the future.

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