Introduction
This crop bulletin information provides data from the FAO GIEWS early warning system at national level for a range of seasonal, vegetation and precipitation variables derived from Earth Observation data. The crop bulletin is not currently derived from national sources of agrometeorological data, but draws on FAO collated data, but presents the indices based on collated dekad reporting; to enable a view of the data on water resources, environmental stresses and impact of vegetation production affecting Afghan cropping systems. This includes seasonal indicators, vegetation indicators and precipitation indicators.
The purpose of crop bulletins is used to reinforce support for policymakers, planners, and private sector for agriculture, food security, stocking, marketing and trade. The approach uses satellite remote sensing data at c 1km scale to monitoring agrometeorological parameters and providing reconnaissance information to support agriculture planning. Data are provided for the two main Afghan cropping seasons: Season 1 is the late autumn/winter sown, spring harvested crops (May – July) and Season 2 (June / July sown to Sept/ October cropped).
Additional crop status, food security data and market and price information at sub-national levels are available from other knowledge exchange portals.
Imagery data are acquired at 10-day (dekad) intervals and used to monitor crop growth, and multi-temporal data are acquires across the cropping season to assess the vegetation changes and size of the cropped area.
Precipitation data are presented by dekad and month and data are obtained from ECMWF (European Centre for Medium
All three vegetation indicators are based on 10-day (dekadal) vegetation data from the METOP-AVHRR sensor at 1 km resolution (2007 and after).
The Seasonal Indicators include details of: i) Agricultural Stress Index), ii) Historic Drought Frequency and iii) Start of Season, Maximum and End of Season of Seasons 1 and Season 2.
The Vegetation Indicators provide i) NDVI Anomaly and ii) Vegetation Condition Index (VCI) data
The Precipitation Indicators include: i) Estimated Precipitation ii) Estimated Precipitation Anomaly, iii) Estimated Precipitation compared with LTA and the iv) Accumulated Estimated Precipitation:
Most geospatial data presented are at national level; the graphs of i) Estimated Precipitation compared with the long term average (1984-2015), ii) Accumulated Estimated Precipitation and the iii) NDVI profile compared with LTA (1984-2015) and previous year are presented at administrative level 1 (i.e. at Province level).
Disclaimer: The boundaries and names shown and the designations used on the maps do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of FAO concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers and boundaries.
Acknowledgements
Data are provided by the GIEWS online system hosted by the FAO
Precipitation
ECMWF
NDVI
METOP
NOAA-AVHRR
Crop Mask
Global Land Cover - SHARE (GLC-SHARE)
