Case Study of Forest Inventory using Drone for Deforestation and Forest Degradation Monitoring

Abstract

I studied the forest inventory method utilizing Drone and SfM technology, and examined the possibility of application to Deforestation and Forest Degradation monitoring. Forest inventory and aerial photography using Drone were conducted with Myanmar as the study site. Orthophoto, DSM, DTM and Point Cloud data were generated by Three dimensional reconstruction software, and compared with the forest inventory result. Orthophoto and Point Cloud data are useful for observing of forest stand condition, forest type interpretation, monitoring and so on. Drone is excellent in portability, it can carry and taking photo at the time of inventory and easily check the forest stand condition. Tree Height Measurement by Point Cloud data and Forest Carbon Stock (Biomass) Estimation by DSM and DTM also had highly correlation with the forest inventory result as a truth data, confirming the feasibility for forest inventory and monitoring utilizing Drone.