Monitoring of new plantation development in tropical rain forests using JERS-1 SAR data Original Research Article

The authors studied the applicability of multi temporal SAR data obtained from JERS-1 SAR for monitoring the change in tropical rain forest conditions due to plantation development. The test site was the southern part of Sumatra Island, Indonesia. A total of seven JERS-1 SAR and one ERS-2 SAR data from 1992 to 1997 were analyzed together with two optical data, MOS-1 MESSR in 1990 and SPOT HRV in 1997. The result of this study verified that the backscatter change in multi temporal JERS-1 SAR data can be used effectively to monitor the process of plantation development in the test site, which accompanies the burning of felled tree trunks after deforestation, one of the causes for forest fire and serious smoke.