A layer of satellite maps showing spring and winter crops for the 2023 harvest has been added to the agricultural producer’s account in the State Agrarian Register.

The published crop maps contain data on the location and area of fields with key agricultural crops, such as: winter wheat, barley, spring cereals, maize, sunflowers, soya, peas, sugar beet, grapes and others. The maps also show forests, wetlands, water bodies or artificial features, bare ground and uncultivated land.

Last year, when allocating budgetary subsidies per hectare of cultivated land among small-scale farmers in the DAR, satellite maps were used for the first time to verify the cultivation of land parcels. The effectiveness of this programme was also assessed using satellite monitoring, which showed that recipients of support had, on average, a larger area under cultivation in the following harvest season than those who did not participate in the programme.

Satellite crop maps were created for the whole of Ukraine by a team of specialists, using imagery from the Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 and Planet satellites. Machine learning technology was applied to classify crop cover.

Source: Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine