The University of Alicante in the Cauca Valley

From 15 to 20 July 2024, two members of the University of Alicante traveled to the Cauca Valley in Colombia in order to achieve some fieldwork related to sugarcane crops. Arturo, a PhD student and Jiayin, a PostDoc, work on the use of SAR interferometry for crop monitoring. At their arrival, they were welcomed by the Colombian partner of the project, AgroAp.

The aim of this trip was to gather enough in-situ data in order to achieve great progress regarding the innovative algorithm that DINOSAR is working on. They were looking for specific data to acquire, such as: field orientation (GPS), photos, stem width, plant height, plant distance and weight.

After one week on site, Arturo and Jiayin had the chance to get to know the ins and outs of the detailed field campaign that will be carried out during the next year of the project. It was an opportunity for them to bring together the on-site experience and knowledge about sugar cane with the skills to work with and interpret time series of satellite data. The team is now ready to poursue the research on the Copernicus-based algorithm development.