The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
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Sentinel-2A takes us over central-eastern Brazil – more specifically where the Bahia, Tocantins and Goiás states meet.
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Here we can see a large, flat plateau blanked with fields benefiting from rich soils and an apparent abundance of water, before falling off into a green, hilly valley (left). The straight lines in the image are roads, such as the highway running in a nearly straight line from the centre-top to bottom of the image.
The area is particularly known for soybean production. The country’s soybean output has increased by more than 3000% since the 1970s, and Brazil is the second largest global producer of soybeans after the US.
Other crops in this area include corn, coffee and cotton.
A distinctive feature in this image is the circles – mainly at the centre. These shapes were created by a central-pivot irrigation system, where a long water pipe rotates around a well at the centre of each plot. The varying colours show different types of crop, or different stages of growth.
The two-satellite Sentinel-2 mission is designed to monitor changing lands, including crop type and health. While the first satellite has been in orbit since 2015, its Sentinel-2B twin was launched on 7 March. Together, the satellites will provide new images of Earth’s land surfaces every five days.
This image, also featured on the Earth from Space video programme, was captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2A satellite on 8 August 2016.