Accuracy Assessment of the Global Forest Cover Map for the Year 2020: Assessment Protocol and Analysis
This technical report presents the assessment protocol to estimate the accuracy of the Global Forest Cover map for the year 2020 (GFC2020), a novel spatial representation of forest presence or absence at 10m spatial resolution. This map is designed to support the risk assessment in the implementation of the EU Regulation on deforestation-free supply chains (EUDR, Regulation (EU) 2023/1115) but its use is not mandatory, not exclusive and not legally binding.. A group of experienced experts from within and outside the JRC interpreted 21,752 sample units. Results show an overall accuracy of 91% with a commission error for forest (areas erroneously mapped as forest) of 18% and an omission error (areas missed to be classified as forest) of 8%. More detailed analysis reveals the reasons for misclassification, e.g. the presence of other wooded land with very sparse tree cover or a mix of shrubs and bushes that can be easily confused with forest or ambiguity in the geolocation precision of the sample unit or the forest boundary. The spatial analysis shows clusters of misclassified sample units, and thus lower accuracies in regions of open dry forests, e.g. in Eastern Brazil or central Australia.
COLDITZ Rene;
VERHEGGHEN Astrid;
CARBONI Silvia;
BOURGOIN Clement;
DUERAUER Martina;
MANSUY Nicolas;
DE MARZO Teresa;
BEUCHLE Rene;
JANOUSKOVA Klara;
ARMADA BRAS Teresa;
DESCLÉE Baudouin;
ORLOWSKI Kasimir;
MUTENDEUDZI Martin;
AMEZTOY ARAMENDI Iban;
FRITZ Steffen;
LESIV Myroslava;
OOM Duarte;
CARREIRAS Joao;
SAN-MIGUEL Jesus;
HEROLD Martin;
BERGER Katja;
NEPOMSHINA Olga;
GOND Valery;
DEFOURNY Pierre;
LAMARCHE Celine;
BOS Audric;
COLLET Thibauld;
DELHEZ Baptiste;
MOLLICONE Danilo;
BASTIN Jean-Francois;
DE HAULLEVILLE Thales;
BRINK Andreas;
LUPI Andrea;
TSENDBAZAR Nandika E;
STEHMAN Stephen V.;
ACHARD Frederic;
2025-04-08
Publications Office of the European Union
JRC141231
978-92-68-26327-3 (online),
1831-9424 (online),
EUR 40284,
OP KJ-01-25-219-EN-N (online),
https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC141231,
10.2760/7632707 (online),
Additional supporting files
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