IAPRS & SIS, Vol.34, Part 7, “Resource and Environmental Monitoring”, Hyderabad, India,2002
PREFACE
The ISPRS Technical Commission (TC) VII International Symposium On Resource And
Environmental Monitoring, held in Hyderabad, India during December 3 - 6, 2002 has attracted
wide representation from various themes of the six Working Groups of the Commission VII.
Besides, there have been three sessions on Inter-Commission topics and three sessions on special
interest themes. In all, about 410 papers including invited and lead papers are accommodated in
the symposium, out of which 290 could find their way into this proceedings. The electronic
version of the proceedings is distributed to the symposium participants on CD-ROM.
While "Resource and Environmental Monitoring" is not a new theme for the Earth Observation
community, availability of EO data with higher spatial, spectral and temporal resolutions,
advances in data analysis/ fusion techniques and modeling are bringing renewed attention. The
TC VII symposium theme and the blend of papers reflect this observation. In the domain of TC
VII, technology, science and applications are symbiotic. Thus, though the Working Group (WG)
VII/3 themes that focus on the state of environment and resources still make a dominant part of
the proceedings, many contributions in WG VII/1 explore tools such as advanced classifiers, data
fusion, hyper spectral methods and retrieval of geophysical and bio physical parameters. Not
many papers deal in the photogrammetry, despite the widespread popularity of the subject
towards infrastructure planning in the world. But, spatial modeling through GIS is seen as an
integrated trend in most remote sensing investigations that are reported.
It is heartening that a substantial number of papers are written in the area of incubating
technologies and pilot applications such as Sustainable Agriculture, Precision Farming (WG
VII/2),, Monitoring Cultural Heritage sites (WG VIUA), Spatial Data Infrastructure, Internet
resources (WG IV/4) and Transportation (TC I). Use of global data sets to understand geosphere-
biosphere interaction has been another area of interest. Harnessing space technology in the field
of disaster monitoring, mitigation and damage assessment is an area of significant importance
and covered in this symposium. There is also an impressive adaptation of concepts like
vulnerability, sustainability and prioritization in many of the experiments. These are easily
recognizable in papers on resources and environment pertaining to soil, water, forest, coast and
land use (WG VII/3), which together make up for nearly half of the contributions. A special
session on ocean colour reflects the growing interest in the field of ocean biology and fishery
resources.
The proceedings aptly reflect the contemporary perception in earth observation across the globe
and raises hope of judicious use of space technology for ensuring sustainable development.
Preparing this volume is made possible by the untiring efforts of officers of ISPRS, authors, TC
VII constituents, symposium host and the many co-sponsoring entities. Indian Space Research
Organisation, as the Principal Sponsor of the symposium has made the endeavour of the
symposium possible.
Hyderabad Rangnath R. Navalgund
November 22, 2002 President, ISPRS TC VII
