The Mongolian Data Cube has just been installed at the National Agency of Meteorology and the Environmental Monitoring (NAMEM) in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
The Mongolian Data Cube and its associated software makes it possible to quantify and visualize satellite data and derived environmental products, covering the whole of Mongolia at up to 10 metre resolution. This innovative technology makes it possible to access the most up-to-date satellite imagery showing the current pasture conditions, levels of snow, temperatures and drought, and compare these with long term average conditions. Agencies will be able to access information to analyse the situation throughout the country without having to do a time- and resource-consuming in-person assessment.
This is especially relevant in Mongolia where nearly a third of the population make their livelihood from traditional forms of livestock herding, but who can be exposed to extreme environmental events known as ‘dzuds’, which are characterised by dry, arid summers, adversely affecting pasture growth, followed by extreme cold and snow in winter leading to a subsequent loss of livestock. Dzuds are becoming more frequent because of climate change and can devastate animal numbers and livelihoods, with resulting social and economic damage.
Importantly the Mongolian Data Cube provides a flow of satellite derived information to the PRISM emergency response system that was set up at Mongolia’s National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) as a part of an initiative supported by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP). The PRISM system allows the emergency response teams to make more informed decisions when preparing for difficult winter conditions, with the ultimate goal of mitigating the risk of dzud and enhancing herders’ resilience capacity.
The eOsphere team leading the SIBELIUs project have been working in Mongolia since 2007, when they installed a satellite ground receiving station at NAMEM, so during this period they have built a very productive working relationship with Mongolian institutions. However, the SIBELIUs project, which started in 2018 with the support of the UK Space Agency’s International Partnership Programme, has made it possible to develop new techniques for extracting the most relevant environmental information from satellite data and distributing it as widely as possible to decision makers, including meteorologists with agricultural skills based in NAMEM centres all around the country.
An important feature of the Mongolian Data Cube is its Visualisation Website, which allows anyone to access the satellite derived information, regardless of whether they know anything about satellites.
