Forest area in Russia and is variations based on the synthesis of the remote sensing products
We submit the review of the modern remote sensing (RS) products which provide information on the forest cover in Russia and are publicly available. The map of forest cover was compiled based on Geographically Weighted Regression of the recent RS products and crowdsourcing data. The map has the spatial resolution of 230 m. It shows the spatial distribution of the forest cover as at 2010. Using this estimate the area of forest in Russia according to the national forest term (without shrubs accounted for as the lands with forest cover) is 711.3 mln. ha. Compared to the official data of the State Forest Inventory (SFI) the forest cover area is significantly higher in the European part (+12.2 mln. ha or +8%), and significantly less (-39.8 mln. ha or -7%) in the Asian part. The forest cover variations during the 2001-10 decade is provided and the controls are discussed (the main ones are the forest fires and the reforestation on the abandoned agricultural lands). The technique used and the compiled forest cover map could be used for evaluation and monitoring of forests in the framework of improvement of Russian forest accounting system.