Applications of microwave remote sensing of soil moisture for agricultural applications

Agricultural irrigation is the largest (80%) user of freshwater resources. With increasing freshwater demand, it is important to make optimal use of water resources with improved agricultural productivity through objective and accurate information provided by remote sensing. This paper reviews the potential of applications of microwave remote sensing of soil moisture and vegetation for agricultural application. Microwave remote sensing can be used to estimate soil moisture on the basis of large contrast that exists between the dielectric constant values for dry and wet soils. Temporal monitoring of water availability at soil root zone during growth periods of crop could prevent water stress and improve the productivity. At field scales, the high resolution soil moisture data can be better used for irrigation scheduling through precision agriculture. At larger scales, low resolution soil moisture data as alternative to vegetation index can be used to monitor and predict crop yield. Because microwaves penetrate cloud, microwave remote sensing could be a good alternative to VIS/IR hyperspectral data for monitoring vegetation distribution, health and water needs for agricultural applications.