This project aims to develop a high resolution, seasonal, and up-to-date information on irrigation extent and acreage from NASA Earth Science observations to enhance USDA Foreign Agriculture Service (FAS) Decision Support System. The primary goal of FAS is to improve foreign market access for U.S. agricultural products by providing accurate global crop production, supply, and demand estimates that are of primary national importance. To improve these estimates the International Production Assessment unit of FAS now requires the capability to rapidly separate and delineate irrigated and dryland agriculture every crop season. The capability to accurately identify and estimate irrigated agriculture is especially important for countries where irrigated agriculture plays a dominant role because yields on irrigated lands can be nearly twice or more than those on dryland farmed areas. However, national-(and occasionally)subnational-level information on irrigated acreage of major crops is not routinely available and even if available, this information often tends to be flawed, outdated or simply lacking to be useful in seasonal crop production estimates. The primary objective of this project is to fill this gap in each of the nine FAS mandate regions by using NASA Earth Science measurements and research results. In the first part of the study, new satellite remote sensing data sets provided by MODIS will be combined within non-parametric, tree-based classification models to provide binary irrigation information at continental scales. In this effort, historical and current modeled soil moisture data, cropland masks, historical and current spectral and temporal vegetation indices that are specifically sensitive to irrigation, and training(learning)examples obtained from medium resolution(< 100 meters)remotely sensed data will provide the primary inputs to the classification algorithm. In the second part, classification results of AWiFS data will be merged with a priori knowledge on irrigation presence obtained in the first part to identify and map irrigated areas at greater spatial detail. Expected results and products from this research include:(1)automatic methods to estimate global extent and acreage of irrigation through remotely sensed observations that are also applicable to future NASA and/or commercial missions/sensors;(2)integration of NASA Earth science research results into the USDA-FAS decision support system for applications of national priority by providing accurate and timely information on the location and extent of irrigated croplands in each of the nine FAS mandate areas;(3)improvement of a DSS specifically developed to disseminate global crop production related information broadly across the nation for a large national benefit;(4)direct contribution to NASA¿s Agricultural Efficiency applications area through the direct use of NASA's investments in remote sensing;and(5)integration of commercial remote sensing and geospatial information with NASA Earth Science measurements to improve a nationally important DSS.