Case Study: Frankfurt Zoological Society monitors deforestation and illegal mining with Planet

Monitoring Threats to Wildlife and Ecosystems

The Frankfurt Zoological Society (FZS) faced the challenge of monitoring illegal activities like mining, logging, and poaching in remote, hard-to-access protected areas. Traditional methods such as overflights and ground surveys were costly, time-consuming, and often hampered by political conflict or budget constraints. FZS needed a way to quickly detect and verify threats to provide timely, actionable evidence to local law enforcement agencies. They turned to Planet and its SkySat satellite imagery service for a solution.

Planet provided FZS with high-frequency, high-resolution SkySat imagery, which offered ease of use, a constantly renewed scope of data, and trusted, timestamped evidence. This solution enabled FZS to rapidly identify hot spots of illegal activity, such as dredging in Ukraine's Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and gold mining in the Amazon rainforest, without the expense of physical expeditions. The result was a more cost-effective monitoring program that allowed FZS to share crucial information with partners quickly, leading to faster law enforcement actions and the prevention of incalculable damage to protected wildlife and ecosystems.

Frankfurt Zoological Society

Manuel Engelbauer

South American Program Officer