Small Satellites are used for Humanitarian Efforts!

In recent years, small satellites have been used by commercial industries to provide better quality location based services. These satellites have allowed many businesses as well as many government agencies to give us important information and reliable service for much of the technology that we use today.

While most of the work has been done to improve commercial interests, it has also been directed towards humanitarian efforts as well. NASA has been heavily pushing small satellites in this direction by emphasizing on Earth science for the year 2017. NASA intends to support the development of commercial satellites in order to use the data for addressing important issues such as disaster management, food security, weather forecasting and much more. Commercial companies are also aiming to address humanitarian issues. One company in particular, Descartes Labs, aims to use its technology to address the global food crisis.

Descartes Labs aims to address the global food crisis by utilizing a wide variety of tools that involve small satellites. Descartes Labs captures satellite images and, with the help of deep machine learning, makes accurate predictions of food production and availability that are more granular, frequent and precise than those of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Predictions and forecasting of crop yields and conditions could be used to help mitigate the effects of a food shortage and ensuring that effective response systems are put into place to avoid disaster.