Report of the APRSAF/SAFE Executive Board Meeting Online

The APRSAF/SAFE Executive Board Meeting was held online on August 28, 2026. It was co-chaired by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). The main topic of meeting was progress reports of SAFE Projects (SAFE Rice Monitoring and SAFE CH4Rice). The participants shared the current status of the projects as well as their future plans. 31 participants from Asia-Pacific region joined the meeting.

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Result of the APRSAF/SAFE Executive Board Meeting

1. Rice Monitoring Project

    Summary
    • JAIF project successfully completed, final JAIF workshop held at GISTDA in May 2026.
    • GISTDA presented achievements of JAIF project at ASEAN committee AJCCST-14 in June 2026.
    • Various updates to INAHOR and related tools throughout recent months.
    • AFSIS will utilize SAFE achievements in their project regarding the improvement of rice statistics.
    • AFSIS INAHOR workshop, in-country training in collaboration with MAFF, AFSIS and ministries of agriculture; confirmed utility of INAHOR data for rice mapping in Thailand.
    • JAIF project, major achievement: Improvement of Paddy Rice Area Statistics Using EO for ASEAN; completed all major activities now; ongoing trainings held that resulted in rice area maps for various countries and now released on the AFSIS website.
    • AFSIS-GIS (ASEAN Food Security Information System - Geospatial Informalization Support) project implemented by AFSIS also utilizes JAIF project results to further advance AFSIS-GIS project activities.
    • AFSIS plans to disseminate country-specific rice maps by incorporating GIS-related functions including INAHOR maps which present data at provincial level on the AFSIS website.

    Discussion and Future Plan
    • Evaluation report submitted to JAIF and ASEAN Secretariat, following completion in June 2026.
    • Project was evaluated by both remote sensing and agricultural experts. Overall evaluation was very good.
      • Recommendation was to continue facilitating data use in this area and help AFSIS continue disseminating this information to end users.
    • Created the final report with this evaluation, which was accepted without any issues.
    • NISAR will be a significant complement to ALOS, Sentinel and LOTUSat going forward and the future of the project will explore integration.
    • Making connections to CH4Rice: these rice maps are very useful as baseline information to assess methane emission.
    • Further discussion needed with ISRO about how to expand to south asia (i.e., beyond south-east asia) and regarding Bangladesh
      • VEDAS SASYA tool available for other countries in S-E Asia. QGIS plugin can be used to generate crop map, both using VEDAS data and otherwise.
      • Over Bangladesh, coverage is limited in VEDAS. Request for more coverage in VEDAS.
    • Action: Bimal to provide contact name and details for new POC of VEDAS to JAXA SAFE team.

2. CH4Rice Project

    Summary
    • Early results show that satellites can detect when rice fields are flooded or drained, which could support methane credit programs at scale.
    • Satellite data (Sentinel-1/-2, ALOS-2, etc.) can estimate planting date, crop growth stage, and plant height.
    • Contributed to a Special Issue of Remote Sensing. (MDPI, ISSN 2072-4292)
      • "CH4Rice Project: Assessment of Methane Emission from Rice Paddies and Water Management Using Remote Sensing Technology"
    • Looking at utility of NISAR S-band data to complement existing sources.
    • Investigating the comparative utility of the various SAR bands (X, C, S, L), and also the polarisations (not full-polarization to increase observation frequency) is a key topic.
    • In-situ water-level measurements are being compared with ALOS-2 PALSAR-2 full-pol data.
    • Built a common understanding among stakeholders on the use of satellite data for rice methane MRV and carbon credit schemes. Expanded collaboration with private-sector partners to support large-scale implementation of Alternate Wetting-Drying (AWD) monitoring.
    • Common technical challenges and future work across projects include:
      • Scaling from plot-level to provincial.
      • Increasing temporal resolution with multiple SAR platforms.
      • Using multiple SAR bands together and developing a classification algorithm using multi-frequency SAR or optical data.
      • Improving detection under dense canopy (L-band sensitivity) and understanding the relation between growth stage and canopy density; Understanding backscattering mechanisms for high plant height.
      • Evaluating dual-polarization SAR to increase the frequency of observations.
      • Identifying conditions that are challenging for SAR and verifying applicability at a global level.
      • Large multi-site validation datasets remain scarce.
    • Major achievement: Around 80% accuracy in classifying inundated vs non-inundated fields across sites in Vietnam, Japan, Thailand, Indonesia, and Bangladesh
    • Major findings:
      • Dense canopy reduces L-band sensitivity to underlying water.
      • Although HH are more commonly provided, VV seems to give better results.

    Discussion and Future Plan
    • Continue to conduct field surveys (in-situ water level measurement and CH4 flux monitoring).
    • Compare in-situ water-level with ALOS-2 PALSAR-2 full-polarisation data.
    • Use of dual-pol SAR, NISAR, ALOS-4, and optical satellite data to increase observation frequency.
    • Development of a low-cost methane/water-level measurement device.
    • Scale from study areas to larger areas and national-level monitoring.
    • Promote dialogue with stakeholders for applications including proposal of a second Special Issue of Remote Sensing that would demonstrate the use of the same water level estimation methods to define a common algorithm.
    • Coordinate and cooperate with private companies' activities (emission trading) and propose satellite usage to guideline documents by Verra/Gold standard/JCM, etc. with donor agencies using special issue(s).
    • Need to standardise/harmonise a methodology for a joint carbon credit mechanism.
      • Need to identify key topics that should be prioritised for standardisation. This is needed before full uptake of satellite data for methane MRV can be possible.
    • Noting that there are different results achieved using different polarisations, we need to do a study into the differences and make a recommendation for a common approach to polarisation.
    • Held a discussion on whether full polarisation data is still needed, or whether HH and HV is sufficient. This is a question that needs to be answered this year.
      • Full polarisation data leads to higher accuracy field identification, but there is a trade off in coverage.
      • With a switch to just HH and HV, swath width and hence coverage will increase. Does the systematic coverage perhaps outweigh the benefits of the full pol data? This is an open question.
      • This would be one step towards standardisation - recommending a specific polarisation.
      • Open question: Do we need to improve methodologies to increase accuracy or will we gain more accuracy with more systematic coverage.
      • Action: Continue discussion offline and at APRSAF-32.

3. NISAR Data Provision and Potential Application In the SAFE Rice Monitoring and CH4Rice Projects

    • Studied coverage for eight rice methane study sites to assess feasibility and application of NISAR S-band data.
    • All sites are covered by the L-band data, but only the Bangladeshi, Indian, Indonesian (ascending orbit only) and Thai (ascending orbit only) are covered by S-band data.
    • Four CH4Rice study sites are not currently covered by NISAR's L+S band joint mode, so discussions are ongoing with NASA JPL to include the sites in the NISAR observation plan.
    • Initial tests have been conducted for paddy mapping with NISAR S-band data, with > 90% accuracy. An active crop map from NISAR S-band data is being created for India, which will be available from Bhoonidhi.
    • 2-3 more field and drone campaigns planned with hyperspectral and Lidar. Modelling set up for CH4Mod and validation.
    • ISRO requests JAXA share time series ALOS-4 Interferometric data over the Indian test site.
    • All S-band data disseminated through Bhoonidhi. L-band data is accessible from NASA EarthData. Over Indian regions, L-band data will be available in Bhoonidhi subsequently.

4. Discussion for SAFE New Project Creation: AquaWatch Regional Alliance

    • Focus on water quality issues for the region.
    • Various pilot sites and projects already established in Indonesia, Malaysia, etc. and working with JPL on new approaches for remote sensing of water quality.
    • Through CEOS, CSIRO is hosting discussions on water quality with international space agencies including NASA.
    • Proposed side event for APRSAF-32 to progress project and also welcome any countries that would be interested in this to join the regional alliance.
    • Hope in 2027 to have more workshops and knowledge sharing to build capability in regional countries, with a focus on water quality in the aquaculture industry.
    • SAC/ISRO starting work on aquaculture and inland fisheries and are very eager to be a part of this project. Dr Rahe of Bangladesh also interested, noting the trend toward inland fisheries in the country.

>>Agenda