Monitoring the earth's resources from space–Can you really identify crops by satellite?

Abstract

Of the most important questions facing society today, those near the top of the list include the status and future of the world's food supply, its environmental quality and its sources of energy. These questions have increasingly been before the general public in recent years and have for an even longer period of time, been of concern to the world's thinkers, planners and policy makers. It had long been recognized that after all, our earth and its resources are finite and that as society continues to grow we must find better ways to manage these finite resources.