DECADE ACTION INCUBATOR 3

Advance the application of remote sensing to coastal habitat mapping and monitoring

Coastal habitats - mangroves, seagrass, salt marshes and coral reefs—are vital ecosystems. They store carbon and buffer the effects of floods and storms, help lessen the effects of climate change, and serve as nurseries for a range of species and absorbing runoff from farming.

To conserve coastal habitats, it is important to know the distribution and spatial-temporal change of these important habitats.

Remote sensing is an important tool for filling in critical information gaps for mapping and monitoring coastal habitats, yet significant barriers exist for operational use within the ecological and conservation communities. The recent advance of remote sensing technology and free access to high-resolution RS imagines open up new opportunities to apply remote sensing to coastal habitat mapping and monitoring, not only for research, but more importantly for conservation and management.

This incubator will share several application cases on coastal habitat mapping, analyze technological limitations and knowledge gaps between research and conservation. It aims to explore how to advance RS technology and its applications and thus generate solutions to coastal habitat conservation.