Southern Africa Mapping and Assessment of Biomass Burning   

 

David Roy

               

Stolen from the Gods or harnessed from nature, fire has played a central role in human history. Humans have been using fire since at least 100,000 years ago and archeological remains in Kenya suggest human exploitation of fire may be ancient, going back 1.6 million years. The savannas of Africa experience the most extensive biomass burning in the world.

 

 

The use of fire is integral to many African agricultural practices. Fire has local to regional impacts on land use, productivity, carrying capacity, and biodiversity, and regional to global impacts on biogeochemical and atmospheric processes. These impacts are both positive and negative but are not well understood and are complicated by rapid and substantial social, economic, and environmental changes.  The frequency, intensity, season, and type of fire that prevails are referred to as the fire regime. How fire regimes will change as human populations, their land use practices, and the climate changes is unclear. These changes are likely to affect fire regimes directly, through changes in the ways fire is used, and indirectly, by modifying the environmental conditions and the amount of fuel available for fire.

 

 

Currently, there are no adequate data on the size distributions, occurrence, or trends in fire numbers or areas burned annually in southern Africa. Local fire information exists for some national parks, forests, and conservation areas, but is not representative of the region as a whole.

 

 

Spaceborne sensors provide a unique perspective with which to study and understand the distribution and characteristics of fire. In this project a change detection algorithm has been developed to make spatially explicit maps of burned areas. The accuracy of these dramatic new satellite maps is being evaluated by members of SAFNet. These maps are an important step in creating a long-term fire record and are being used to understand the timing and extent of fire in southern Africa with the goal of predicting if and how fire regimes are changing. 

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Figure: Burned areas mapped June – October 2002 using  daily Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer

satellite data over 250 * 800km (Angola, Zambia, Namibia and Botswana borders are shown in black).

The rainbow colors show the day of burning (blue at the beginning, red at the end of the 5 month period).

 

 

 

For more information contact David Roy at droy@kratmos.gsfc.nasa.gov.