Capturing ephemeral forest dynamics with hybrid time-series and composite mapping in the Republic of Panama

Measuring and progressing toward international goals of curbing deforestation and improving livelihoods of people who depend on forests requires nuanced understanding of forests and the processes surrounding deforestation and degradation. Despite rapid improvements in Earth Observation technology, monitoring of tropical forests remains hindered by persistent cloud cover, heterogeneous landscapes, long wet seasons, and small and ephemeral clearings masked by rapid growth. A hybrid method is presented that combines elements of both time-series and compositing approaches to best overcome these obstacles to map forest cover and change in the Republic of Panama based on Landsat imagery. The resulting Panama Vegetation-Cover Time-Series (PVCTS) maps depict forest cover in Panama from 1990 to 2016 at 30 m resolution. Acknowledging the fuzzy boundary between forest and non-forest classes, these maps employ a hierarchical classification scheme that reflects the natural process of regeneration and can accommodate different definitions of forest and deforestation. Classification accuracy is 97–98 % between forest/non-forest categories and 76–81 % for deforestation events. The maps show a slight greening of Panama from 1990 to 2016 caused by expansion of young secondary growth. The annual rate of deforestation in mature forest has remained around -0.6 %/yr, although young forests have matured at a similar rate such that there is no net loss of forest. While estimates of total forest cover are similar to official national estimates depending on forest definition, there is little agreement in location of deforestation events.