Publié le 17 juin 2021
Brazil is the world’s number one exporter of coffee, and Patrocínio is one of the country’s most important coffee production areas, with about 78% of its economy related to coffee. As most of the southeast of Brazil, the Patrocínio area suffers from the most severe drought in 91 years.
This false-colour visualisation of an image acquired by one of the Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellites on 13 June 2021, shows the area around Patrocínio in the state of Minas Gerais in Brazil.
Water shortages are affecting the 2021 coffee harvest and threatening the 2022 crop as well. According to a recent study published in the scientific journal Nature Communication, these extreme drought conditions will become increasingly frequent in the area, and the economic consequences will affect not only Brazil's economy but also that of Europe, a major importer of coffee.
The open data from Copernicus missions and services are a unique tool for monitoring the effects of climate change on vegetation, at any latitude.
Source: European Union DG DEFIS Image of the Day
On the occasion of the The World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought, we invite you to (re)discover the STEREO projects that are working to better understand and combat desertification and drought:
U-TURN contributes to the fight against desertification and drought
STR3S: Fluorescence to better understand transpiration
SAT-EX: The global ecosystem more limited in water than expected