Problem: Often, rainfall is not enough for crop production, and we must bring in water artificially. Across Europe, the agricultural industry is using more and more water for irrigation. But with the climate changing and populations growing, we are seeing rainfall decreasing and production increasing in many regions. We need a solution to support farmers to irrigate their crops efficiently.
ESA-backed solution: A project supported by ESA Space Solutions called ClimField developed a service that uses Earth observation satellite data to help farmers make decisions related to irrigation and water management.
The project, which ran from February 2020 to November 2021, was carried out by WASAT, a Polish company aiming to provide geoinformation services and IT solutions based on satellite data. ClimField used Copernicus data – mainly imagery from the Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-3 satellites, as well as Copernicus Land Monitoring Service land cover maps and a Digital Elevation Model – to help farmers in Poland find out whether to irrigate their fields, how much water to use, and which parts of the farm need water most.