Interactive Map

Using the Living Earth approach, maps of land cover have been generated for Wales, Australia and, more recently, the coastal zones of Papua New Guinea. The map interface for Wales is being upgraded to provide a new interactive map — whilst this is being developed, please select Countries > Wales > Tools: See it on a Map to access the products from 2018–2023. Those for Australia are available by selecting Countries > Australia > Tools: See it on a Map.

These maps provide a platform for visualising how people and nature have shaped the landscapes we see today, obtained primarily from historical satellite data and updated through near-daily observations. Initially, select the broad land cover as the base map, then add layers that represent different categorical (e.g. crop type) or continuous (e.g. water persistence, above-ground biomass) environmental descriptors to give more detail.

Maps for Wales

View maps of habitat extent (for Wales only), generated through direct translation of some classes (e.g. broadleaved forest) from the land cover map, or by splitting mapped classes using contextual information such as the extent of peatlands or coastal environments.

The uniqueness of Living Earth legends

The legends used for land cover and change are globally relevant, based on the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Land Cover Classification System (LCCS) and Living Earth's Global Change Taxonomy. The taxonomies used for habitat maps (where existing) are specific to the country.

Free and open for everyone

All Living Earth layers are openly available and accessible for people to use, and to view current and historical changes in the national landscape over varying time periods and understand the reasons for these. The maps can be used for multiple purposes, including assessing past and current land management and impacts on carbon, biodiversity, and soil, water and air quality — and to inform local, national and international policy.

Earthtrack App

Earthtrack has been designed to be used by a wide range of users with varying levels of expertise and background knowledge — citizen scientists, park rangers or academic researchers. Data submitted can be used directly to validate maps of land cover, habitat and change generated primarily from Earth observation data, using the same taxonomies: the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Land Cover Classification System (LCCS) and Living Earth's Global Change Taxonomy.

Earthtrack can be downloaded from the Google Play Store or the Apple App Store. To access data from Earthtrack or stream it to your GIS, see Get the Data.