For over 10 years, India s Earth-pointing space cameras have helped farmers sow their fields, fishermen cast their nets, city planners design new towns, and navigators move around the sea. Ikonos is a privately-funded satellite put together by Space Imaging Inc. that will forever change the landscape of Earth imaging. Its views, as an example, will clearly mark the 10-yard lines on a football field. But while Ikonos will show better images, India, as one of the only developing countries with its own remote sensing satellite, will likely retain its reputation for having developed some of the world s most useful applications for Earth imaging. The country can now prevent the destruction that millions of locusts cause throughout India s western states wreak.
Satellites predict their path, giving farmers enough time to spray pesticide over the right areas.
And in the coastal areas, tens of thousands of fishermen have been trained to read color satellite images of the ocean to pick the best locations and times to unfurl their nets. In addition to saving crops, India s satellites have also made life considerably easier for many villagers. In Rajasthan, where deserts sprawl, villagers have had to walk up to 25 kilometers to find potable water. India s remote sensing satellites have eliminated that distance in 60 villages by finding untapped well sites within town limits. That is why in applications we are far, far ahead.