Jihua Meng

Remote sensing-based global crop monitoring: experiences with China's CropWatch system

Monitoring the production of main agricultural crops is important to predict and prepare for disruptions in food supply and fluctuations in global crop market prices. Chinas global crop-monitoring system (CropWatch) uses remote sensing data combined with selected field data to determine key crop production indicators: crop acreage, yield and production, crop condition, cropping intensity, crop-planting proportion, total food availability, and the status and severity of droughts. Results are combined to analyze the balance between supply and demand for various food crops and if needed provide early warning about possible food shortages. CropWatch data processing is highly automated and the resulting products provide new kinds of inputs for food security assessments. This paper presents a comprehensive overview of CropWatch as a remote sensing-based system, describing its structure, components, and monitoring approaches. The paper also presents examples of monitoring results and discusses the strengths and limitations of the CropWatch approach, as well as a comparison with other global crop-monitoring systems.

Generation of high spatial and temporal resolution NDVI and its application in crop biomass estimation

Abstract While data like HJ-1 CCD images have advantageous spatial characteristics for describing crop properties, the temporal resolution of the data is rather low, which can be easily made worse by cloud contamination. In contrast, although Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) can only achieve a spatial resolution of 250 m in its normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) product, it has a high temporal resolution, covering the Earth up to multiple times per day. To combine the high spatial resolution and high temporal resolution of different data sources, a new method (Spatial and Temporal Adaptive Vegetation index Fusion Model [STAVFM]) for blending NDVI of different spatial and temporal resolutions to produce high spatial–temporal resolution NDVI datasets was developed based on Spatial and Temporal Adaptive Reflectance Fusion Model (STARFM). STAVFM defines a time window according to the temporal variation of crops, takes crop phenophase into consideration and improves the temporal weighting algorithm. The result showed that the new method can combine the temporal information of MODIS NDVI and spatial difference information of HJ-1 CCD NDVI to generate an NDVI dataset with both high spatial and high temporal resolution. An application of the generated NDVI dataset in crop biomass estimation was provided. An average absolute error of 17.2% was achieved. The estimated winter wheat biomass correlated well with observed biomass (R 2 of 0.876). We conclude that the new dataset will improve the application of crop biomass estimation by describing the crop biomass accumulation in detail. There is potential to apply the approach in many other studies, including crop production estimation, crop growth monitoring and agricultural ecosystem carbon cycle research, which will contribute to the implementation of Digital Earth by describing land surface processes in detail.

Crop classification using multi-configuration SAR data in the North China Plain

Crop classification is a key issue for agricultural monitoring using remote-sensing techniques. Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data are attractive for crop classification because of their all-weather, all-day imaging capability. The objective of this study is to investigate the capability of SAR data for crop classification in the North China Plain. Multi-temporal Envisat advanced synthetic aperture radar (ASAR) and TerraSAR data were acquired. A support vector machine (SVM) classifier was selected for the classification using different combinations of these SAR data and texture features. The results indicated that multi-configuration SAR data achieved satisfactory classification accuracy (best overall accuracy of 91.83%) in the North China Plain. ASAR performed slightly better than TerraSAR data acquired in the same time span for crop classification, while the combination of two frequencies of SAR data (C- and X-band) was better than the multi-temporal C-band data. Two temporal ASAR data acquired in late jointing and flowering periods achieved sufficient classification accuracy, and adding data to the early jointing period had little effect on improving classification accuracy. In addition, texture features of SAR data were also useful for improving classification accuracy. SAR data have considerable potential for agricultural monitoring and can become a suitable complementary data source to optical data.

Remote Sensing Based Detection of Crop Phenology for Agricultural Zones in China Using a New Threshold Method

In recent years, the use of high temporal resolution satellite data has been emerging as an important tool to study crop phenology. Most methods to detect phenological events based on satellite data use thresholds to identify key events in the lifecycle of the crop. In this study, a new method was used to define such thresholds for identifying the start and end of the growing season (SOS/EOS) for 43 different agricultural zones in China. The method used 2000–2003 NOAA Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) satellite data with a spatial resolution of eight kilometers and a temporal resolution of 15 days. Following data pre-processing, time series for the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI or N), slope of the NDVI curve (S), and difference (D) between the NDVI value and a base NDVI value for bare land without snow were constructed. For each zone, an optimal set of threshold values for N, D, and S was determined, based on the remote sensing data and observed SOS/EOS data for 2003 at 261 agro-meteorological stations. Results were verified by comparing the accuracy of the new proposed NDS threshold method with the results of three other methods for SOS/EOS detection with remote sensing data. The findings of all four methods were compared to in situ SOS/EOS data from 2000 to 2002 for 110 agro-meteorological stations. Results show that the developed NDS threshold method had a significantly higher accuracy compared with other methods. The method is mainly limited by the observed data and the necessity of reestablishing the thresholds periodically.

Evaluation of Chlorophyll-Related Vegetation Indices Using Simulated Sentinel-2 Data for Estimation of Crop Fraction of Absorbed Photosynthetically Active Radiation

In recent years, the impact of chlorophyll content on the estimation of the fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (FPAR) has attracted increased attention. In this study, chlorophyll-related vegetation indices (VIs) were selected and tested for their capability in crop FPAR estimation using simulated Sentinel-2 data. These indices can be categorized into four classes: 1) the ratio indices; 2) the normalized difference indices; 3) the triangular area-based indices; and 4) the integrated indices. Two crops, wheat and corn, with distinctive canopy and leaf structure were studied. Measured FPAR and Sentinel-2 reflectance simulated from field spectral measurements were used. The results showed that VIs using the nearinfrared and red-edge reflectance, including the modified Simple Ratio-2 (mSR2), the red-edge Simple Ratio (SR705), the RedEdge Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (ND705), MERIS Terrestrial Chlorophyll Index (MTCI), and the Revised Optimized Soil-Adjusted Vegetation Index (OSAVI[705, 750]), had a strong linear correlation with FPAR, especially in the high biomass range. When the red-edge reflectance was used, the ratio indices (e.g., mSR2 and SR705) had a stronger correlation with crop FPAR than the normalized difference indices (e.g., ND705). Sensitivity analysis showed that mSR2 had the strongest linear correlation with FPAR of the two crops across a growing season. Further analysis indicated that indices using the red-edge reflectance might be useful for developing FPAR retrieval algorithms that are independent of crop types. This suggests the potential for high resolution and high-quality mapping of FPAR for precision farming using the Sentinel-2 data.

Validation of HJ-1 B charge-coupled device vegetation index products with spectral reflectance of Hyperion

To validate the HJ-1 B charge-coupled device (CCD) vegetation index (VI) products, spectral reflectance data from EO-1 Hyperion of a close date were used to simulate the band reflectance of the HJ-1 B CCD camera. Four vegetation indices (the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), the ratio vegetation index (RVI), the soil adjusted vegetation index (SAVI) and the enhanced vegetation index (EVI)) were computed from both simulated and actual HJ-1 B CCD band reflectance data. Comparisons between simulated and actual HJ-1 B CCD band reflectance data, as well as that between simulated and actual HJ-1 B CCD vegetation indices were implemented to validate the VI products of the HJ-1 B CCD camera. The correlation coefficients between simulated and actual HJ-1 B CCD band reflectance data were 0.836, 0.891, 0.912 and 0.923 for the blue, green, red and near infra-red bands, and the correlation coefficients between simulated and actual HJ-1 B CCD VIs were 0.943, 0.926, 0.939 and 0.933 for SAVI, RVI, NDVI and EVI. The standard deviation of differential images between actual and simulated HJ-1 B CCD VIs are 0.052, 0.527, 0.073 and 0.133. The results show that the VI products from the HJ-1 B CCD camera are consistent with the simulated VIs from Hyperion, which proves the reliability of HJ-1 B CCD VI products.

Modified vegetation indices for estimating crop fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation

The fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (FPAR) is an important biophysical parameter of vegetation. It is often estimated using vegetation indices (VIs) derived from remote-sensing data, such as the normalized difference VI (NDVI). Ideally a linear relationship is used for the estimation; however, most conventional VIs are affected by canopy background reflectance and their sensitivity to FPAR declines at high biomass. In this study, a multiplier, the ratio of the green to the red reflectance, was introduced to improve the linear relationship between VIs and crop FPAR. Three widely used VIs – NDVI, the green normalized difference VI (GNDVI), and the renormalized difference VI (RDVI) – were modified this way and were called modified NDVI (MNDVI), modified GNDVI (MGNDVI), and modified RDVI (MRDVI), respectively. A sensitivity study was applied to analyse the correlation between the three modified indices and the leaf area index (LAI) using the reflectance data simulated by the combined PROSPECT leaf optical properties model and SAIL canopy bidirectional reflectance model (PROSAIL model). The results revealed that these new indices reduced the saturation trend at high LAI and achieved better linearity with crop LAI at low-to-medium biomass when compared with their corresponding original versions. This has also been validated using in situ FPAR measurements over wheat and maize crops. In particular, estimation using MNDVI achieved a coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.97 for wheat and 0.86 for maize compared to 0.90 and 0.82 for NDVI, respectively, while MGNDVI achieved 0.97 for wheat and 0.88 for maize, compared to 0.90 and 0.81 for GNDVI, respectively. Algorithms based on the VIs when applied to both wheat and maize showed that MNDVI and MGNDVI achieved a better linearity relationship with FPAR (R2 = 0.92), in comparison with NDVI (R2 = 0.85) and GNDVI (R2 = 0.82). The study demonstrated that applying the green to red reflectance ratio can improve the accuracy of FPAR estimation.

Fallow land mapping for better crop monitoring in Huang-Huai-Hai Plain using HJ-1 CCD data

The prediction of grain production is essential for socio-economic development planning, guidance and control of macro cropping structure adjustment. Fallow areas should be identified each growing season which is critical for grain production prediction. This paper focuses on fallow arable land monitoring during summer grain season in the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain using China Environment Satellite HJ-1 CCD data. With the two satellites HJ-1A and HJ-1B, high temporal Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) can be obtained. HJ-1 CCD data were acquired from early March to early June in 2010 over the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain. Multi-temporal HJ-1 CCD data were pre-processed and time series of NDVI were derived. An algorithm for separating cropped and fallow areas was developed based on three key periods of NDVI in early-March, mid-April and mid-May, 2010. The influence of fallow arable lands to yield estimation and crop condition monitoring over the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain were also investigated and analyzed. Preliminary results in this paper showed that HJ-1 CCD data are capable for fallow land monitoring. Information of fallow arable lands is an essential part of crop monitoring and it should be incorporated into crop monitoring systems. In the future, the fallow lands over autumn grain season should also be identified and information of fallow arable lands should be generated yearly in order to get more reliable production prediction.

A Method to Assess Land Productivity in Huang-Huai-Hai Region Using Remote Sensing

Huang-Huai-Hai region is one of the main grain production regions, thus it is helpful to assess land productivity in this region for informing land users about their land quality and supporting policy and decision-making. In this paper, the land quality was monitored by crop yield estimation. Based on estimating crop biomass and harvest index with remote sensing, the crop yield of Huang-Huai-Hai region from 2005 to 2008 was estimated. And with multiple cropping index, which was also estimated with remote sensing, the single crop season yield was calculated. Then the land productivity of the region was divided into three levels, high, medium and low productivity, based on different standard in different agroecological zone. After the analysis, it was concluded that the cropland acreage which is in the medium or low level is huge, more than 80%, therefore, due to the limited uncultivated arable land and difficulty to increase proportion of grain crops in Huang-Huai-Hai region, it must be a significative tool for increasing grain production to improve the crop yield where the crop yield level is medium or low.

Study of a Vegetation Index Based on HJ CCD Data's top-of-atmosphere reflectance and FPAR Inversion

The Fraction of Photosynthetically Active Radiation (FPAR)absorbed by plant canopies is a key parameter for monitoring crop condition and estimating crop yield. In general, it is necessary to obtain Top of Canopy (TOC) reflectance from optical remote sensing data in digital number through atmospheric correction procedures before retrieving FPAR. However, there are a few of uncertainties that existe in the process of atmosphere correction and reduced the quality of TOC. This paper presents a vegetation index based on Top-of-Atmosphere (TOA) reflectance derived from HJ-1 CCD satellite for estimating direct crop FPAR. The vegetation index (HJVI) was designed based on the simulated results of a canopy-atmosphere radiative transfer model, including TOA reflectance and corresponded FPAR. The HJVI had taken the advantages of information in the green, the red and the near-infrared spectral domainswith with a aim of reducing the atmospheric effect and enhancing the sensitive to green vegetation. The HJVI was used to estimate soybean FPAR directly and validated using field measurements. The result indicated that the inversion algorithm produced a good relationship between the prediction and measurement (R2 = 0.546, RMSE = 0.083) and the HJVI showed high potential for estimating FPAR based on the HJ-1 TOA reflectance directly.