Our project will provide quick and useful data for farmland area comparisons. In order to aid any investigations by scientists, governments and local authorities into the agriculture of struggling regions due to COVID-19.
As a team we are fans of the farming simulator game Stardew Valley. So upon joining the hackathon, we thought 'Food for Thought' would be an interesting challenge as it relates to what we were doing the night before.
Our initial approach was to fan out and search for as many resources related to agriculture as possible. Ranging from satellite datasets comparisons to news/scientific outlets publishing papers on the effects of COVID-19 to agriculture around the globe. We also used the considerations and example resources as guidance as to where to look for our data and research.
None of us had any experience in processing or downloading Earth Observation data, and it became the most time-consuming part of our journey as we spent most of our time juggling from database to database, hoping for one that exist in a format that we are already familiar with. After some time, we decided to turn this problem around. We decided to use NASA Earthdata visualisations to work our way around directly analysing images provided from that database.
Our approach from here on would be utilising the Python Imaging Library (Pillow) to dissect agricultural quantities from satellite images. Provided that we were running short on time, we decided to try and make a working program to do one simple job first in the image dissection; it is to calculate the percentage farmland cover with respect to the total area. Given if we had more time and experience (we are still budding physicists!), we are confident that we could widen the functionality of our program and develop it to become even more useful than its current state.
Satellite Images:
- https://worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov/
- https://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/data/set/aglands-pastures-2000/maps
- https://lpdaac.usgs.gov/
Research Documents:
- http://www.scielo.org.pe/scielo.php?pid=S2077-99172020000100003&script=sci_arttext&tlng=en - What is the impact of COVID-19 disease on agriculture?
- https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cjag.12235?casa_token=0vdFqFyVz8gAAAAA%3A-YlMDKk-kn2TSsqklChp2AENkxOBvO23ne12GEo7WZKzyO8zGwxIle2MGZ18OZPMym1Gax__COY - Agriculture, transportation, and the COVID‐19 crisis
- https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/cjag.12236 - Potential Implications of COVID-19 on the Canadian Pork Industry
- https://apps.fas.usda.gov/newgainapi/api/Report/DownloadReportByFileName?fileName=COVID-19%20in%20Vietnam_Ho%20Chi%20Minh%20City_Vietnam_05-13-2020 - USDA Report - Vietnam
- http://www.igidr.ac.in/pdf/publication/WP-2020-013.pdf - COVID-19 Impact on India
- https://www.gtap.agecon.purdue.edu/resources/download/692.pdf - CIES Discussion Paper
- https://elibrary.worldbank.org/doi/pdf/10.1596/33540 - Macroeconomic Policy COVID-19
- https://insight.wfp.org/impossible-choices-bolivias-coronavirus-conundrum-590affa5dcab - World Food Program: Bolivia
- https://insight.wfp.org/growing-food-to-tackle-coronavirus-and-child-malnutrition-in-malawi-e9ffedcbd3f - World Food Program: Malawi
- https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/03f23b51-3dfb-48a1-a57a-1b66e840f4b6 - Sheep and lambs on census day (Canada)