Illisys V2: A Solution dedicated to the monitoring of Illicit Crops
1. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF SPOT IMAGE ILLICIT CROP MONITORING
PACKAGE
1.1 Presentation of Spot Image general activities and know-how
Spot Image is a French commercial company in charge of multi-source satellite image diffusion
worldwide, i.e. SPOT data as well as radar and optical data acquired from other satellite
systems. As far as SPOT data are concerned, the network of direct receiving stations which is
expanding since the creation of the company in 1987 allows to cover most part of the world.
Spot Image also designs and offers satellite image derived products and services in a wide
variety of application fields, such as agriculture and forestry, urban planning, cadastre,
environmental assessment and monitoring, defence. More specifically, since 1990, Spot Image
has developed a successful and intensive project activity which allows to demonstrate the SPOT
technology capacity and to fulfil the needs for integrated solutions, i.e. adequate satellite data
acquisition, thematic data extraction, software and hardware provision, complete transfer of
technology through training and technical assistance. Year after year, the company has gradually
built an end-to-end range of skills in terms of satellite image application project, which starts
from project design with in-depth need analysis and feasibility study, funding and partnership
set up, to project management with provision of appropriate data and data processing system,
training and technical support. Moreover, with the two main shareholders, CNES (French
National Space Centre) and EADS Astrium (European Satellite Company) , Spot Image benefits
from a very diversified and strong distribution network, cooperation with several service
companies in Europe and around the world and a very skilled team of experts.
In this favourable context, Spot Image is designing turnkey solutions which not only encompass
satellite data acquisition but also include adapted equipment for data processing and technical
support. The particularity of these application packages is that they are adaptable to a certain
extent according to the customer needs and constraints. In the case of agriculture, where satellite
data are expected to be acquired and delivered on time, Spot Image has already developed a very
cost effective data production service, which allows to guarantee the customer with the supply
of good quality data on the required site. This can be illustrated with the precision farming
programme of EADS Astrium in Europe, FarmstarÒ, for which Spot Image supplies SPOT data
of individual fields acquired at very specific times of the year for estimating crop fertilisers
needs or crop potential yield. In other fields of agriculture such as agricultural statistics,
agricultural production management and agri-environmental monitoring, there is a need for
more comprehensive services with supply of data but also of appropriate data processing
software and methodology. This is also the case of illicit crop monitoring.
1.2 Spot Image experience in illicit crop monitoring projects
Illicit crop monitoring with satellite imagery has been a subject of interest at Spot Image for
more than 12 years. Illicit crops mainly refer to coca bush, opium poppy and cannabis
cultivation. The most significant experience of the company in this field have been the projects
conducted in Colombia and Thailand at a national level and the feasibility study carried out with
the European Space Agency (ESA) and the United Nations for Drug Control Programme
(UNDCP) in 1999 – 2000 at a global scale.
In the early 90’s, Spot Image with two French partners, IGN, the National Geographic Institute
and Matra, the Space Industrial company, equipped and trained the organism in charge of opium
poppy survey in Thailand, ONCB (Office for National Drug Control). Since then, ONCB has
developed a methodology based on satellite images and aerial reconnaissance survey which is
used every year to map opium poppy fields and produce national statistics.
In the late 90’s, Spot Image with the French government equipped and trained the police
administrative unit in charge of coca bush monitoring and eradication in Colombia, which
remains the first cocaine producing country in the world. SPOT data were used to map coca
bush plantations which could be clearly detected from the surrounding primary rainforest. A
specific GIS software, Illisys v1, was developed by Spot Image in order to help the police to
build a geographic database, quickly produce good quality maps and integrate automatically
GPS data such as the fumigation tracks. Indeed, in Colombia, aerial herbicides spraying is
conducted each year for eradicating coca bush cultivation. The airplanes are equipped with a
GPS system connected to the sprayer in order to record the actual tracks over coca plantations.
Boosted by these experiences, Spot Image could bring tangible elements to the ESA-UNDCP
study which aimed to assess the usefulness of satellite image technology coupled with GIS for
mapping and monitoring illicit crops in the main producing countries, i.e. Afghanistan,
Myanmar, Lao PDR for opium production and Colombia, Bolivia and Peru for cocaine
production (UNODC, 2004). More specifically, the objective was to evaluate the possibility to
set up an homogeneous methodology for all these countries which would allow to locate illicit
cultivation sites every year and estimate the surface area and yield in a reliable, coherent and
accurate way.
The study showed the many facets of illicit crop cultivation and the various strategies developed
by each country in the attempt to monitor and sometime eradicate the illicit crop. In the same
country and for the same illicit crop, there is no one but many cultivation patterns which vary
according to crop cycle (i.e. sowing and harvest dates), farming practices (i.e. use of fertilisers,
plant density and crop association for example), geographic location, production level (i.e.
intensive or extensive cultivation). In general, intensive eradication campaigns bring changes in
illicit crop cultivation which tends to be more diversified and distributed in remote and
inaccessible areas. However, the study demonstrated that all countries faced the same lack: a
system which would allow a complete, objective and reliable annual inventory of crops, an
annual monitoring with change detection analysis in the crop location and crop surface area, the
reduction of ground field work which usually weighs heavily on the budget, the planning of
drug control programmes (i.e. alternative development and eradication operations) and the
production of statistics at various levels (i.e. local administrative unit level, national level).
In this context and compared to aerial and ground survey, the usefulness, cost effectiveness and
operational side of satellite images was fully demonstrated. In particular, SPOT data provide
homogeneous information in space and time allowing reliable comparison and thus reliable
monitoring assessment, cover vast territories at specific period of time thanks to programming
capacity of SPOT satellites, provide an accurate cartographic reference system allowing precise
surface estimation and crop location, provide as well a complete, high quality and up-to-date
picture of the illicit crop cultivation landscape which facilitates navigation and interpretation
while conducting field work and can also be used as background information when presenting
map results. However, because of the diversity of cultivation patterns, the detection of illicit
crop fields on satellite image strongly depends on the level of ground expertise, even with the
new generation of satellite data, such as SPOT-5 images which can provide multispectral
information at a ground resolution of 2.5 m. Therefore, the study also recommended the
development of a dedicated GIS software solution which would allow to use satellite image with
ground observations in order to map illicit crop fields and to estimate changes in surface area
and location from one year to the next.
Despite the fact that the present Illicit Crop Monitoring Programme of UNODC (United Nations
Office on Drugs and Crime) has not invested in Remote Sensing and GIS technology for all
targeted countries, Spot Image has pursued its efforts in the same direction as the 1999 appraisal
in designing a dedicated package and upgrading the monitoring system of Colombia in 2000 and
Thailand in 2003 – 2004.
