Funding: European Space Agency Express Procurement [Plus] – [EXPRO+]

Description: The overarching objective of this project is to develop and demonstrate applications that advance the use of Earth Observation (EO) data in the European Statistical System. Detailed discussions with the National Statistical Offices (NSOs) of Poland, Greece and Finland have taken place as to how this aim can best be achieved. The NSOs will closely follow the activities of the project as well as offer key insights throughout its duration. The consortium has strong links with each of these agencies. NOA has a memorandum of cooperation with ELSTAT for integrating Earth Observation in support of official statistics. IGIK has built a strong relationship with Statistics Poland through the EO4STAT project and others, while FMI and its local partner SYKE provide key data to Statistics Finland. Based on the discussions, a set of case studies of active and clear interest to the agencies have been identified for which the addition of EO data can significantly improve the quality of statistics with respect to current capabilities. These focus on the domains of air quality, well-being and water statistics, though they also have some applicability to other domains. These case studies should become the basis of new operational EO-based services provided to the NSOs, becoming showcases for how EO data can help the NSOs and opening the door to wider adoption of EO by the statistical community. They are chosen to be new and innovative from the perspective of the agencies, while also being sufficiently mature so as to provide a successful demonstration. The project, lessons learnt and barriers will be closely documented in a Roadmap which will delineate the process of EO becoming a solid part of the Trusted Smart Statistics concept, while also opening up new avenues for the broader use of EO by the National Statistical Offices.

Role of APCG: Project Coordination – Implementation of the Greek case study on air quality. Enhancement of the current practices of the Greek NSO regarding the Air Quality Directive (AQD) IPR Reports (statistical product 114 in the NSO’s work programme) by integrating satellite, smart-sensor and modeling data to the current data provided by the regulatory network, while spatially reaching a resolution of LAU level (as opposed to the current coarse disaggregation).

Official Website: https://www.eo4smartstats.com/