Amazon and Central Africa Forest Change Data Sets

Deforestation data sets are provided by the Deforestation Mapping Group (DMG) of the Global Land Cover Facility at the University of Maryland. Originally funded by the NASA Landsat Pathfinder Humid Tropical Deforestation Project as a collaborative effort between the University of Maryland at College Park's Geography Department, The University of New Hampshire's Complex Systems Research Group, and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center's GIMMS Group, the goal of this work involves the mapping of global deforestation for the humid tropics using data sets from both Landsat TM (Thematic Mapper) and ETM+ (Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus) for the 1980s and 1990s. The project focused on the three regions where the majority of global tropical deforestation has ocurred: Amazon Basin, Central Africa, and Southeast Asia.
The data sets consist of Landsat TM and ETM+ spectral bands from the same WRS path and row tile for multiple dates co-registered to one another. The forest cover classes are as follows: (1) Forest -- Tree cover presumed to be > 40% crown closure; (2) Degraded Forest -- Forested areas that are undergoing thinning for agriculture or selective logging or regenerating after clear cuts and may include plantations; (3) Nonforest -- Includes non-woody cover types, open woodlands and brush lands, permanent agriculture, swamps; (4) Water; (5) Cloud -- Sometimes includes cloud shadow; and (6) Shadow (from terrain or clouds). Current forest cover data sets include country products for Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, and Democratic Republic of Congo, and time series products for Pan-Amazon (non-Brazilian) deforestation, other Pan-Amazon areas of interest, and Central Africa Region.