ESCAP Regional Drought Mechanism

Space Applications Section
ICT and Disaster Risk Reduction Division
United Nations ESCAP

9th GEOSS
Asia-Pacific Symposium
11-13 January 2017
Tokyo, Japan

ESCAP and RESAP• United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia andthe Pacific (ESCAP)• 62 member and associate member States• ESCAP’s Regional Space Applications Programme for
Sustainable Development (RESAP) has been operating foraround 22 years• Covers 25 member States
Guided by Resolution 68/5 Asia-PacificPlan of Action for Space Applicationsand GIS for Sustainable Development(2012-2017), though focus is primarily
on disastersRegional Drought Mechanism• Strengthen the capacity of drought-prone member to access and effectively
utilize space applications and GIS for drought monitoring and early warning• Build regional cooperation platforms for capacity building on droughtmanagement• Complement drought monitoring capacity with seasonal forecasting foreffective planning• Build greater capacity of drought-prone member States to develop a longterm planning, climate adaptation and drought management approach throughclimate risk analysis• Pilot countries: Mongolia, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan,
Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Nepal• Regional Service Nodes: China, India, Thailand and potentially others
providing other services RIMES (seasonal forecasts), Australia (waterbudgeting (TBC)), etc….

What the mechanism offers..
1. Access to satellite data, products and services• Data from multiple earth observation satellites• Products – Agricultural drought indices• Services – Immediate: seasonal forecasts, in-season crop/vegetation
monitoring and early warning; next step: crop forecasting, agriculturalland use/land cover changes for sustainable agriculture and efficientwater management• Customization of services for different institutions
2. Building the Institutional Capacity• Specialized capacity development• Networking with Regional Service Providers in China and India,Thailand, as well as with RIMESLong-term benefits• Link in-season monitoring with forecasts:• Monsoon Forum
Drought Mechanism• Additional data, information and tools• Experts from various countries committed to support• Customized products for the national circumstances• Tailored capacity building to utilize space informationand applications• With greater awareness, opportunities exist for otherapplications – other Ministries, expanding beyond
space applications, etc.….

Example of Mongolia and Sri Lanka

Agro-ecological zones identified
Drought mapping was made combined by 3 regions which has more than 50%
correlation including forest, steppe, desert steppe. The correlations between RS
index and Drought index calculated by meteorological parameter were different
in various natural zones separately.

Natural regional made from mapping of land cover classification by MODIS data in 2010.

ForestSteppeDesert Steppe

Soil moisture 10cmvsRS indicesr = >45 (NDDI, VHI, TCI…)
r = >45 (VSWI)
r = >45 (VHI)

AIvs
RS indices

SPIvs
RS indicesr = >49 (TCI)
r = >45 (TCI, VHI)

r = >46 (TCI, VSWI)
r= >46 (TCI)

Indices tested

NDDI

TCI

VCI

VHI

VSDI

VTCI

VSWI

NMDI

SPI

AI

Mapping 10 drought indices using data 14 years.
Choice the following drought indices.
- RS drought indices (NDDI, TCI, VCI, VHI, VSWI)- Meteorological indices (SPI, AI)

Yearly combined drought map - 2014
June, 2014

July, 2014

August, 2014++Overlay

Drought
Products
Validation

Figure 13. Measurement of thebiomass, CO2 andenvironmental parameter in2009, 2010, 2011 field study at
the Tuv, Dundgovi, Khentii
aimags

VHI2011.SepVHI2010.AugDroughtWatch for Mongolia• Data management(in-situ, statistics, Geotiff etc.)• Data preprocessing(RS data processing, composition)• Indices calculation• Drought monitoring(by single index and combination indices,dashboard)• Statistics and analysis(over the spatial, over time interval)• Batch for the whole procedure• DroughtWatch3.1(English+Chinese)Access to variety of EO data for Sri Lankan Drought• Drought Assessment using Interactive tools and data download• Exclusive access to Sri Lanka for online information• Training & hand-holding for data processing and analysis

http://bhuvan.nrsc.gov.in.

Mobile Smartphone - Field Data Collection (FDC)• Mobile smartphone technologies for field data collection, online datatransmission and geo-visualisation on Bhuvan platform.
• This has two partso Device based solution for field data collection and upload to servero Server-end App to process data, validation and geo-visualization ofarchived data

Geo-visualization of Collected Data

Smart Phone

Smart Phone Application

Cellular /Internet connectivity

High-end Server

http://bhuvan-staging.nrsc.gov.in/lanka1/lanka1/training.php

ISRO support to Myanmar

Progressionof Myanmar
NDWI during
the summer
croppingseason 2016

Thank you
Kelly Hayden
Space Applications Section
Information and Communications Technology
and Disaster Risk Reduction Division
Email: haydenk@un.org

ESCAP
Web: www.unescap.org
Twitter: @ESCAP
Pre-conference event for 7th AMCDRR