The INPE Inaugurates New Center in the Amazon Region

Hello reader!

It follows one communicates published in english on the day (01/07) in the website of the National Institute for Space Research (INPE) announcing that the INPE Amazon opens the Monitoring Technology International Diffusion Center.

Duda Falcão

INPE Amazon Opens the Monitoring Technology

International Diffusion Center

July 1, 2010

In its Regional Centre in the Amazon state (CRA) in Belém, the National Institute for Space Research (INPE) will train technicians from several countries for the rain forest satellite monitoring. For that reason, on Thursday (1 July), during the opening of the CRA headquarters, INPE will make agreements with three international cooperation agencies and national and foreign institutions.

Along with the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (ABC), the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Natural Renewable Resources (IBAMA) and the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) signed an agreement to carry out nine courses that will be taught in English, French and Spanish idioms over three years - from 2010 to 2013.

Now, the letter of understanding executed between the INPE and the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (ACTO) will allow the training of technical teams from the South America countries throughout the forest extension, making it possible the region forestall coverage be fully monitored as INPE has been making in the Brazilian Amazon region for more than 20 years.

And the partnership with the Institute of Research Development (IRD), France, will result in the distribution of satellite images for research in the Northern and Northeastern part of Brazil through the SEAS Programme Brazil, officially launched during a ceremony in Belém.

Managed by INPE’s general director, Gilberto Câmara, who executed the agreements with Katsuhiko Haga, JICA’s representative Chief, and the ACTO’s Ambassador Mauricio Dorfler, the opening ceremony was attended by the State Secretary for Development, Science and Technology of Pará, Maurilio de Abreu Monteiro, among other regional authorities, institution Representatives of Japan and France, INPE’s managers and scientists and technical-scientific organs of the Amazon.

"The opening of this building reflects the INPE’s desire to contribute to a sustainable development, not just from Amazon, but the entire tropical region," said Cláudio Almeida, of the CRA/INPE.

Global Monitoring

The INPE wants to share its experience of more two decades in the Amazon monitoring with its partners, ensuring the transfer of technologies for image processing and manipulation of large databases, to all countries interested in implementing monitoring systems to the forestall coverage change.

Training courses will be held on the CRA/INPE, in Belém, Which will become the international diffusion center of technology by satellite monitoring of rain forests. The foreign technicians will learn how to use the TerraAmazon, the system developed by INPE for their monitoring program which will be used freely.

Based on satellite images to monitor deforestation in the Amazon made by INPE is internationally recognized for its excellence and pioneering. Over 22 years of history, PRODES is the largest world tracking program for covering four million square kilometers of forests each year. The PRODES result shows the annual rate of deforestation by shallow cut in the Brazilian Amazon and has guided the formulation of public policies for the region.

DETER system has been in operation since 2004, - Deforestation Detection in Real Time, elaborated to guide and control the monitoring of shallow cut and forest degradation more quickly. In 2008, with the expansion of degraded areas indicated by DETER, it motivated the DEGRAD creation. All this technology developed in Brazil by CRA/INPE is available to the global monitoring of tropical forests.

INPE- Amazon

Since January 2009 the Amazon Regional Center (Belém) from the National Institute for Space Research (CRA/INPE) has been in operation and on Thursday is the opening of the building that will house the Laboratory for the Global Monitoring of Tropical Forests by Satellites. The CRA/INPE also will have a satellite data reception station, in Boa Vista, and an INPE’s Environmental Monitoring Center, in Manaus.

The CRA will also support field activities and mapping carried out by INPE in the Amazon region, maintaining infrastructure for collecting and processing data in their facilities. Improving the geo-technologies knowledge in the Amazon, this INPE’s new branch shall become an international center for technology diffusion of tropical forest satellite monitoring.

Source: WebSite of the National Institute for Space Research (INPE)