The Global Environment Monitoring System: Selected Works on Ecological Monitoring of Arid Areas - GEMS/PAC Information Series No. 1

This paper gives a brief description of ecological monitoring - what it is, how it works, what results it produces and what it costs. The Global Environment Monitoring System (GEMS) Programme Activity Centre of the United Nations Environment Programme (UN) is responsible for coordinating United Nations endeavours in environmental monitoring, particularly of pollution, climate and renewable natural resources. The system of ecological monitoring being applied by the GEMS arid land renewable resource monitoring network collects time-series information on the life-support capacities of large areas of land. The three-tiered approach, using data collected from the ground, from light aircraft and from satellites, is the result of more than a decade of research and practical application throughout the world's rangelands, Africa in particular.