Advancing Ecosystem Monitoring with Global High-Resolution Maps of Vegetation Biophysical Properties

Environmental restoration projects are crucial for ecosystem recovery and biodiversity conservation but monitoring progress at a global scale poses substantial challenges. Publicly funded satellite missions such as Sentinel-2 have great potential to transform ecosystem monitoring due to their high spatial and temporal resolution if they can be reliably linked to ecosystem characteristics. Here, we present the first global, analysis-ready, decametric maps for three key vegetation biophysical properties on an annual basis, including effective leaf area index (LAIe), fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (FAPAR), and fractional vegetation cover (FCOVER). We utilize a hybrid retrieval approach of the physically based radiative transfer model PROSAIL to directly estimate biophysical variables from multispectral Sentinel-2 images, making use of multiple observations during the peak of the growing season. All retrievals are aggregated into mean values, standard deviations, and the number of observations taken during this period. The maps are available at 20 m, 100 m, and 1000 m spatial resolution for the years 2019 to 2024, totaling approximately 20 TB of analysis-ready data, and are validated using in-situ data from the Ground-Based Observations for Validation (GBOV). The annual temporal and decametric spatial resolution of these maps provides new opportunities for biodiversity and ecosystem monitoring, enabling more effective assessments of restoration efforts and contributing to the development of standardized global monitoring frameworks.