NASA Harvest News
NASA Harvest's Africa Lead, Catherine Nakalembe, spoke with NASA's Earth Observatory about the ongoing drought in Uganda's Karamoja region & the impact on local harvests. These ongoing dry conditions are driving food insecurity, with crisis outcomes expected through 2024.
NASA Harvest Director, Inbal Becker-Reshef, appeared on NPR's All Things Considered podcast to discuss our work monitoring Ukrainian agriculture and how it is being impacted by the Russian invasion, particularly Harvest's recent finding that millions of acres of farmland have been abandoned due to the war.
A recent paper from NASA Harvest-UMD explores how satellite data can be used to study global agricultural market connections. The study found that early forecasting was able to reduce price fluctuations by up to 12% for wheat importing countries, while reversing price shocks for major soybean importing countries. Read the University of Maryland's article about the findings here and learn more about the study here.
NASA Harvest and IFPRI teamed up to study the impact of adverse weather events on international migration flows. Mixed findings suggest that climatic stresses can both prompt migration in search of better opportunities, but may sometimes hinder it due to impacts on agricultural productivity and household liquidity. Read the detailed analysis here.
A delegation from the Egyptian Ministry of Agriculture met with representatives of NASA Harvest, GLAD, and NASA Acres at the University of Maryland. Attendees discussed areas of potential collaboration including crop condition monitoring, crop type mapping and crop production forecasting, insect infestations, and irrigation management.
A diverse group of NASA Applied Sciences' remote sensing experts held a productive meeting with a delegation from Chile's Natural Resources Information Center (CIREN) to explore the applications of Earth Observation (EO) technology in agriculture. These meetings foster international collaboration, helping to drive development of satellite-based information systems and agricultural decision support tools.
Catherine Nakalembe on World Bank's Development Podcast
NASA Harvest's Africa Lead, Catherine Nakalembe, joined the World Bank's Development Podcast to discuss how satellite Earth observations can be leveraged to improve early action response, agricultural resilience, and sustainable food systems especially for vulnerable communities.
Survey on Smallholder Yield Modeling
NASA Harvest has been tasked by the US Agency for International Development Feed the Future Initiative (USAID FTF) to evaluate the yield modeling landscape in smallholder settings to inform future interventions and investments.

To get a sense of the landscape beyond academic literature review, we appreciate input from organizations in the commercial and non-governmental sectors on relevant portfolios. The data collected in this survey will be presented to USAID stakeholders in a white paper that may be available for public viewing. Given potential sensitivities of disclosing intellectual property, any part of this survey is optional. Please feel free to contact us with any queries at https://nasaharvest.org/form/contact.
Upcoming Events
The NASA ARSET team is holding a training on the use of spectral indices for various land and aquatic applications. Trainees will be introduced to eight spectral indices, discuss the correct circumstances for each, and perform hands-on indices calculation over selected study regions. Participants will use Landsat 9 OLI-2, Sentinel-2 MSI and Harmonized Landsat Sentinel-2 (HLS) data during the workshop. Trainings will be held twice each day, from 11-12 ET and 15-16 ET.
The American Geophysical Union's (AGU) annual fall meeting will be held in San Francisco this year. As always, the meeting serves as an opportunity for scientists, policymakers, students, and organizations to connect and discuss leading research in the field of Earth science. NASA Harvest will be in attendance and information on our poster and oral sessions will be made available in advance. We look forward to meeting you there!