Face-to-Face course on High-resolution Land Cover and Crop Monitoring from Space

High-resolution Land Cover and Crop Monitoring from Space

The 20th F2F course of the EO AFRICA R&D Facility will take place in Dakar, Senegal, between February 1st – 5th, in close collaboration with Centre de Suivi Ecologique (CSE). This course is designed to introduce participants to relevant high-resolution Earth Observation (EO) datasets, tools and analysis techniques in the context of land cover, land degradation and cropland monitoring. The course will be taught in French only, while learning materials will be available in English.

 

The course is organised in 5 days filled with theoretical lectures ensuring sufficient understanding of the conceptual background and hands-on exercises performed in a cloud-computing environment to gain the required technical skills on data manipulation and interpretation. Focus will be on free and open-source satellite data and derived products, particularly from the Copernicus program. Specific topics include land cover mapping and land cover change analysis, land degradation assessment, crop type mapping and parcel-based crop monitoring, including crop condition and crop production. Participants will be challenged to think about applying these concepts and skills to their own use cases.

Upon completion of this course, participants will:

  • Be aware of both the advantages and limitations of open-source satellite EO data for the purpose of land cover and cropland monitoring.
  • Know how to select, access and use the right open-access data and tools for applications related to land and crop monitoring.
  • Gained practical experience on land cover and land cover change mapping.
  • Have been exposed to advanced time series analytics, including break point analysis, to assess land degradation.
  • Know how to generate cropland and crop type masks using 10m resolution satellite data for your region, season and crops of interest.
  • Gained an understanding on how satellite data can be leveraged for crop condition assessment.
  • Have practiced the use of open-source software and cloud computing for image processing.

Each day of the workshop will consist of a morning and afternoon session with a total duration of 6 hours. Participants will be asked to shortly present and reflect upon their own work during the last day of the training.

ABOUT THE COURSE

A 5-day training course (6 hours per day), with theoretical lectures and hands-on exercises performed in a cloud-computing environment.The course will take place on 1 – 5 February 2027

CAN I APPLY?

Max. 25 participants residing in African countries, will be selected based on their academic background, work experience and motivation to participate.
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Who can participate?

Space is limited to a maximum of 25 participants. Participants will be selected based on their academic background, work experience and motivation to participate. We will strive to have a gender-balanced and country-balanced group of participants. You will receive a confirmation e-mail about selection results and further information by December 16th 2026.

Participants should reside in one of the African countries, should have an academic background related to Geoinformation/Earth Observation Science in combination with knowledge on Environmental Sciences, Forestry, Agriculture, Geography, or similar. Prior experience in Python programming and the use of cloud environments will be an asset but not a requirement. Young researchers in the field of land and agricultural monitoring are encouraged to apply!



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Schedule

Each day of the course will consist of a morning and afternoon session with a total duration of 6 hours. Each session will combine lectures, practical exercises and discussions. Participants will be asked to shortly present and reflect upon their own work during the last day of the training.

  • Morning session: 9:00 – 12:30 (including coffee break).
  • Lunch break: 12:30 – 13:30.
  • Afternoon session: 13:30 – 17:00.

Certificate of Attendance

Participants who have been actively participating during the course will be given a Certificate of Attendance issued by the EO AFRICA R&D Facility and Centre de Suivi Ecologique.

Technical requirements

Participants are requested to bring their own laptop with GIS software pre-installed (QGIS or ArcGIS). Access to the Innovation Lab (EOAFRICA’s cloud computing facility) will be granted prior to the course. In addition, participants are required to register for a free account on the following platforms that will be used throughout the course:

It is advised that the participants get themselves acquainted with the free online courses of the EO AFRICA R&D Space Academy:

Cost and Sponsorship

Attendance to the training course is free of charge.

Participants will need to arrange and pay for their own travel, subsistence and accommodation. Lunch and coffee/tea break will be provided during the workshop. For those not living in Dakar, the Facility can sponsor for a limited number of participants up to EUR 200 to cover such expenses. Should you want to apply for this funding, please indicate it in the application form. Payment – upon proof of expenditures – of the 200 Euro (max) will go via bank transfer and will be arranged after completion of the workshop.