Introduction to Special Issue: Integrating Earth Observation into Impact Studies in Agriculture and Climate Change

Earth observation (EO) data can help advance our understanding of drivers of agricultural productivity, as well as the complex relationships between this productivity and natural resources, conflict, and climate change. This special issue provides a wide range of papers highlighting some of the benefits–and challenges–of integrating EO data into impact studies in these contexts. EO can provide objective estimates of cereal crop productivity, land use, environmental conditions, and some agricultural practices. The high frequency and long time series of EO data can also enable observation of state-dependent impacts, as well as longer-term dynamics. The wide geographic coverage of EO data further allows direct observation of spatial spillovers–including environmental harms or improvements–and can provide data from fragile or conflict-affected settings where collecting ground data may not be feasible. The papers in the issue also show, however, that EO data introduce their own set of challenges, ranging from measurement error to interpretation. The papers together demonstrate that EO data are best used in combination with ground-based data, careful analysis of mechanisms, and transparent discussion of their limitations. The papers also point to many future research directions in both leveraging EO data and addressing those limitations.