CadasterENV Sweden, Multi-Scale and Multi-Purpose Land Cover Monitoring System in Sweden

In order to meet the reporting obligations from international conventions, European directives and national legislations , countries are required to produce up to date, detailed and harmonised information on their land cover and its use, at different scales, and for different domains of applications. All Swedish stakeholders involved in land cover monitoring have emphasized the need for a homogenous and nationwide Land Cover database, which can be updated, on a regular basis and in a cost-effective manner.

The objective of the CadasteENV Sweden project was to develop a national multi-scale and multi-purpose Land Cover mapping and monitoring system in Sweden, according to national user specifications. The system is comprised of two components:
– a Land Cover mapping component based on a stratified approach which makes use of HR (SPOT-5 in prepararation of Sentinel 2) and VHR (Pleiades) data, combined with airborne data (orthophotos and LIDAR data) and existing land information databases in Sweden.
– a Land Cover Change Alert component to detect areas with fast land cover changes (hot spots).

The project was extended to support methodological adaptations to Sentinel 2, and facilitate a national roll-out by the Swedish Environmental and Protection Agency (SEPA). The Swedish National Land Cover Mapping (called NMD) which will be released in January 2019 is based on the Land Cover data model and methods developed by CadasterEnv Sweden.