UNESCO: NASA DISCUSSIONS ON REMOTE SENSING OF

UNCLAS PARIS 005096 SIPDIS FROM USMISSION UNESCO PARIS STATE FOR IO/T JANE COWLEY, EB PAUL ACETO, OES/STAS ANDREW ¶W. REYNOLDS STATE FOR NSC GENE WHITNEY STATE FOR NSF STATE FOR NASA Applied Sciences E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: AORC TSPL EAID SENV SOCI UNESCO KSCI SUBJECT: UNESCO: NASA DISCUSSIONS ON REMOTE SENSING OF BIOSPHERE AND WORLD HERITAGE SITES ¶1. Summary and Introduction. NASA's Program Director for Applied Sciences, Mr. Ron Birk, and Mr. Steve Ambrose of the Program's Disaster Management group, met with various specialists in UNESCO's Earth Sciences Division for exploratory discussions about using NASA "remote sensing" technology on focused projects. End summary and introduction. ¶2. The recent MOU between NASA and UNESCO focuses on utilizing remote sensing technology to acquire baseline environmental information about World Heritage and biosphere reserve sites. ¶3. NASA is interested in remote sensing of these sites as a means of providing baseline measurements techniques that could lead to scientific predictions of natural disasters such as the recent Southeast Asia tsunami. ¶4. UNESCO officials seek to utilize remote sensing data for the management of World Heritage and biosphere reserves, as well as monitoring global water resources. It will develop two to three projects in the next few months using already funded NASA data projects, and it will also initiate discussions on the education programs. OLIVER