Providing precision crop and range protection in the US Northern Great Plains

Abstract

Faculty, students, and staff from eight universities in the U.S. Northern Great Plains formed the Upper Midwest Aerospace ConsortiumUpper Midwest Aerospace Consortium (UMACUMAC) to lead a regional transition to sustainabilitysustainability. One major focus was on agriculture, an important part of the region's economy and social structure. By forming a learning community in concert with farmers and ranchers, UMACUMAC See Upper Midwest Aerospace Consortium has made information an asset as valuable as land, labor, and capital. One primary source of information combined with traditional sources is remotely sensed imagery. UMACUMAC See Upper Midwest Aerospace Consortium has created an end-to-end operation, starting with data acquisition by airborne and orbiting sensors customized to acquire data needed to meet producer demands, proceeding to development of value-added products, and finally making them readily accessible on the WWW to non-expert users whom we also train. A specific example of the operation in action illustrates the economic and environmental benefits that result.