DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17135734
title: Agricultural land use (vector) : National-scale crop type maps for Germany from combined time series of Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 and Landsat data (2023)

description: The dataset contains a map of the main classes of agricultural land use (dominant crop types and other land use types) in Germany for the year 2023. It complements a series of maps that are produced annually at the Thünen Institute beginning in 2017 on the basis of satellite data. The maps cover the entire open landscape, i.e., the agriculturally used area (UAA) and, e.g., uncultivated areas. The generation of the maps involved four steps. Firstly, a raster map was derived from a time series of Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2, Landsat 8, and additional environmental data following the approach of Blickensdörfer et al. (2022). Secondly, agricultural field boundaries were generated based on monthly composites of Sentinel-2 and Landsat 8/9 images using the approach of Waldner et al. (2021). Thirdly, the agricultural fields were spatially overlaid on the raster map, and the class per field was assigned via majority voting. Finally, all the fields were simplified to remove redundant vertices while preserving essential shape.

All optical satellite data were managed, pre-processed and structured in an analysis-ready data (ARD) cube using the open-source software FORCE - Framework for Operational Radiometric Correction for Environmental monitoring (Frantz, D., 2019), in which SAR and environmental data were integrated.

The map extent covers all areas in Germany that are defined as agricultural land, grassland, small woody features, heathland, peatland or unvegetated areas according to ATKIS Basis-DLM (Geobasisdaten: © GeoBasis-DE / BKG, 2020). 

Version v201:Post-processing of the maps included a sieve filter as well as a ruleset for the reduction of non-plausible areas using the Basis-DLM and the digital terrain model of Germany (Geobasisdaten: © GeoBasis-DE / BKG, 2015). 

Validation:The final maps were validated using all pixels of the publicly available IACS parcels from the federal states of Brandenburg, Lower Saxony, and North Rhine-Westphalia that were not used for model training. Classes that are underrepresented in these federal states could therefore not be adequately evaluated (e.g., hops and grapevines). We provide this dataset "as is" without any warranty regarding the accuracy or completeness and exclude all liability. 

The maps are available in FlatGeobuf format, which makes downloading the full dataset optional. All data can directly be accessed in QGIS, R, Python or any supported software of your choice using the URL to the datasets that will be provided on request. By doing so the entire map area or only the regions of interest can be accessed. QGIS legend files for data visualization can be downloaded separately.

 

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References:Blickensdörfer, L., Schwieder, M., Pflugmacher, D., Nendel, C., Erasmi, S., & Hostert, P. (2022). Mapping of crop types and crop sequences with combined time series of Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 and Landsat 8 data for Germany. Remote Sensing of Environment, 269, 112831.

BKG, Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie (2015). Digitales Geländemodell Gitterweite 10 m. DGM10. https://sg.geodatenzentrum.de/web_public/gdz/dokumentation/deu/dgm10.pdf (last accessed: 28. April 2022).

BKG, Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie (2020). Digitales Basis-Landschaftsmodell. https://sg.geodatenzentrum.de/web_public/gdz/dokumentation/deu/basis-dlm.pdf (last accessed: 28. April 2022).

Frantz, D. (2019). FORCE—Landsat + Sentinel-2 Analysis Ready Data and Beyond. Remote Sensing, 11, 1124.

Waldner, F., Diakogiannis, F.I., Batchelor, K., Ciccotosto-Camp, M., Cooper-Williams, E., Herrmann, C., Mata, G., & Toovey, A. (2021). Detect, Consolidate, Delineate: Scalable Mapping of Field Boundaries Using Satellite Images. Remote Sensing, 13, 2197.

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National-scale crop type maps for Germany from combined time series of Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 and Landsat data (2017 to 2021) © 2024 by Schwieder, Marcel; Tetteh, Gideon Okpoti; Blickensdörfer, Lukas; Gocht, Alexander; Erasmi, Stefan;  licensed under CC BY 4.0. 

Funding was provided by the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture as part of the joint project “Monitoring der biologischen Vielfalt in Agrarlandschaften” (MonViA, Monitoring of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes).