Global annual cropland dynamics 2015–2024

作者：Ahmad Khan, Peter Potapov, Svetlana Turubanova, Matthew C. Hansen, Alexandra Tyukavina, Andrew Poulson, Andres Hernandes-Serna, Xiao‐Peng Song, Nancy L. Harris, Fred Stolle · 发表于：Remote Sensing of Environment · 年份：2026 · DOI：10.1016/j.rse.2026.115438 · 研究领域：Remote Sensing in Agriculture、Land Use and Ecosystem Services、Soil and Land Suitability Analysis

Food security worldwide is increasingly threatened by population growth, shifting diets, geopolitical conflicts, and climate change impacts. Annual operational cropland monitoring is required to support the United Nations Zero Hunger Sustainable Development Goal. Landsat satellite data provide a foundation for such global, independent, high-cadence monitoring at 30-m spatial resolution suitable for agricultural policy and management interventions, policy responses, and market adjustments. Here, we used Landsat Analysis Ready Data developed by the Global Land Analysis and Discovery Lab (GLAD-ARD) and machine learning to map global cropland extent annually from 2015 to 2024. We showed that the global cropland area increased by more than 6% over the past decade. By combining sample-based cropland area estimates from our research and the earlier analysis (2003–2019), we estimate that the global cropland area has expanded by nearly 14% since 2003. Between 2015 and 2024, Africa accounted for the largest regional increase (+24.5 Mha). At the national scale, Brazil experienced the largest gain (+16.5 Mha) and Morocco the largest loss (˗0.38 Mha). A third (33.3%) of all new cropland was established through natural vegetation clearing or irrigation expansion within natural drylands. The overall accuracies of the 2015 and 2024 cropland maps were 97.8% (Standard Error 0.3%) and 97.3% (SE 0.4%), respectively. Despite cropland expansion, population growth has outpaced cropland gains; betwe...