Opium yield estimates in Afghanistan using remote sensing

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dc.contributor.authorSimms, Daniel M.
dc.contributor.authorWaine, Toby
dc.date.accessioned2017-03-17T09:25:58Z
dc.date.available2017-03-17T09:25:58Z
dc.date.issued2016-10-31
dc.description.abstractAccurate estimates of opium production are essential for informing counter-narcotics policy in Afghanistan. The cultivated area of opium poppy is estimated remotely by interpretation or digital classification of very high resolution (VHR) satellite imagery at sample locations. Obtaining an accurate estimate of average yield is more challenging as poor security prevents access to a sufficient number of field locations to collect a representative sample. Previous work carried out in the UK developed a regression estimator methodology using the empirical relationship between the remotely sensed normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) and the yield indicator mature capsule volume. The application of the remote sensing approach was investigated in the context of the existing annual opium survey conducted by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and Afghanistan’s Ministry of Counter Narcotics (UNODC/MCN) and indicated the potential for bias correction of yield estimates from a small targeted field sample. In this study we test the approach in Afghanistan using yield data and VHR satellite imagery collected by the UNODC/MCN surveys in 2013 and 2014. Field averaged measurements of capsule volume were compared to field averaged NDVI extracted using visual interpretation of poppy fields. The study compares the empirical relationships from the UK field trials with the Afghanistan data and discusses the challenges of developing an operational methodology for accurate opium yield estimation from the limited sample possible in Afghanistan.en_UK
dc.identifier.citationDaniel . Simms and Toby Waine. Opium yield estimates in Afghanistan using remote sensing. Proceedings of Seventh International Conference on Agricultural Statistics (ICAS VII), 26-28 Oct 2016, Rome, Italy.en_UK
dc.identifier.urihttp://icas2016.istat.it/
dc.identifier.urihttp://dspace.lib.cranfield.ac.uk/handle/1826/11611
dc.language.isoenen_UK
dc.publisherInternational Institute for Sustainable Developmenten_UK
dc.rightsAttribution-Non-Commercial 4.0
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.subjectOpium poppyen_UK
dc.subjectremote sensingen_UK
dc.subjectyield bias correctionen_UK
dc.titleOpium yield estimates in Afghanistan using remote sensingen_UK
dc.typeConference paperen_UK

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