Forest Explorer | A web tool developed by members of the University of Valladolid, finalist of the 2019 Contribute Challenge

The team responsible for developing the web tool consists of a combined team of members of the University Institute of Sustainable Forest Management (iuFOR) and the Smart and Cooperative Systems/ Education, Media, Computer Science and Culture Group (GSIC/EMIC), from the University of Valladolid.

Of 40 ideas have gone to the final of the "Contribute Challenge" 2019 only 10 of which 3 are related to the Master's Degree Data Forest (http://dataforest.uva.es) which is taught at the University of Valladolid (UVa) at the ETSIIAA (Campus de Palencia): "Cubication LiDAR de choperas" by Cooperativa Agresta., "Mushroom Alert" by Fundación Cesefor and "Simple and multipurpose exploration of a five-star forest inventory" of the UVa (GSIC + iuFOR).

Under the slogan "The value of the data for the agri-food, forestry and rural sector" the 2019 call for the "Desafio Aporta" is aimed at identifying new ideas and prototypes based on open data, which help to improve efficiency in these sectors, fundamental for wealth creation and employment; and aims to promote the direct reuse of information generated by the public sector for the improvement of the sector, incentivized the talent, technical capacity and creativity of the participants.

Forest Explorer ("Simple and multipurpose exploration of a five-star forest inventory") of the UVa (GSIC + iuFOR) is a tool that aims to make the National Forest Inventory (IFN), a fundamental resource of the forestry sector, more accessible to non-expert users. There is a five-star LinkedOpen Data (LOD) source from the IFN and GeoNames geographic database, and a web application that facilitates its exploration. This web application relies on an interactive map to easily select areas from the map and display inventory data, and includes more than 4GB of linked open data from the Third National Forest Inventory of Spain (IFN3) and the Spanish Forest Map (MFE50). It has also been possible to carry out thanks to the support of the Crossforest project, a European project (2017-EU-IA-0140) that seeks the publication of open data linked in the forest domain to predict the quality of wood and limit the spread of fires.

Creating the new data source would allow for more advantages than those demonstrated with the web application such as support for advanced queries, ease of integration with other web applications such as support for advanced queries, ease of integration with other data sources, or data enrichment by third parties. These could be applied in scenarios of great forest relevance such as monitoring and analysis of forest risks such as pests and fires, development of forest bioeconomy.

The Forest Explorer is a creation of the LinkedForest team, formed by researchers from the University of Valladolid of the GSIC and iuFOR groups: Guillermo Vega, José Miguel Giménez, Cristóbal Ordóñez, Felipe Bravo, Irene Ruano, Adolfo Ruiz, Miguel Bote, Eduardo Gómez, Juan Asensio and Yannis Dimitriadis. You can see the tool in the link: https://forestexplorer.gsic.uva.es. With a simple browser you have all the inventory information and forest map at your fingertips. Browse the map, select species of trees, filter uses of tiles, discover plots and trees from any point in Spain.

One of the companies collaborating with the Master Data Forest, by the Agresta cooperative, has won the second prize with a web system oriented to choperas locations (i.e. to estimate their volume) locally in La Rioja, although it is exportable to the Ebro and Douro Basin. The main objective is to offer populicultors a prototype capable of providing information on the forest stocks of their plots in order to face the time of the sale of wood.

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More information:

Forest Explorer: https://forestexplorer.gsic.uva.es

iuFOR: http://sostenible.palencia.uva.es

GSIC/EMIC: https://www.gsic.uva.es

Challenge Contributes 2019: https://datos.gob.es/es/desafios-aporta/desafio-aporta-2019

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Media mentions:

18/01/2020 "The 'App' showing the secrets of the forest" The Economist - Agro Magazine
	http://l.e.eleconomista.es/rts/go2.aspx?h=260137&tp=i-H43-Dc-6T8-FyPmJ-1c-1gVE-1c-FyOR8-1NwpSj

14/01/2020 "Trees at the click" Valladolid Daily - Innovators
	http://www.diariodevalladolid.es/noticias/innovadores/arboles-golpe-clic_170743.html
26/12/2019 "Create a forest explorer to follow fires and pests" Diario Palentino
	https://www.diariopalentino.es/noticia/Z6F28CCB0-E002-253B-170722B909BEB907/201912/Crean-un-explorador-forestal-para-seguir-incendios-y-plagas 
26/12/2019 "A forest explorer will follow the evolution of pests and fires" Diario Córdoba
	https://www.diariocordoba.com/noticias/agricultura-medio-ambiente/explorador-forestal-seguira-evolucion-plagas-fuegos_1344405.html 
24/12/2019 "Create a forest explorer to track fires and pests" eldiario.es
	https://www.eldiario.es/tecnologia/Crean-explorador-forestal-seguimiento-incendios_0_977452422.html 
24/12/2019 "Create a forest explorer to track fires and pests" COPE https://www.cope.es/actualidad/tecnologia/noticias/crean-explorador-forestal-para-hacer-seguimiento-incendios-plagas-20191224_581307 
24/12/2019 "Create an application to track fires and pests in Spain" Spain Daily https://espanadiario.es/meteo/crean-aplicacion-seguimiento-incendios-plagas-espana 
24/12/2019 "Create a Forest Explorer to Track Fires and Pests" Voice Populi https://www.vozpopuli.com/actualidad/explorador-forestal-incendios-plagas_0_1312369090.html 
24/12/2019 "Create a Forest Explorer to Track Fires and Pests" Free information https://www.libreinformacion.com/article/Crean-un-explorador-forestal-para-hacer-seguimiento-de-incendios-y-plagas

24/12/2019 "Create a forest explorer to track fires and pests" El Obrero https://elobrero.es/ciencia/39245-crean-un-explorador-forestal-para-hacer-seguimiento-de-incendios-y-plagas.html

24/12/2019 "Create a Forest Explorer to Track Fires and Pests" EFE Agency https://www.efe.com/efe/castillayleon/sociedad/crean-un-explorador-forestal-para-hacer-seguimiento-de-incendios-y-plagas/50000473-4138848 
20/12/2019 "A web tool developed by members of the University of Valladolid that facilitates the exploration of forest inventory, finalist of the Challenge Contributes 2019" Communication Cabinet of the University of Valladolid https://comunicacion.uva.es/es_ES/detalle/Una-herramienta-web-desarrollada-por-miembros-de-la-Universidad-de-Valladolid-que-facilita-la-exploracion-del-inventario-forestal-finalista-del-Desafio-Aporta-2019/