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Aalto University alumnus Joona Laine, MSc (Tech.) has been granted a thesis award by ProGIS, non-profit organisation that promotes the use of geographic information systems (GIS). The award was presented at the GIS-Expo in November. Laine graduated in 2018 from the School of Engineering, where he studied in the Master’s Programme in Geoinformatics. He currently works at GIS company Spatineo.

Laine’s thesis is titled Crop identification with Sentinel-2 satellite imagery in Finland. Automated crop type identification would significantly reduce the costs of controlling the validity of agricultural subsidy applications compared to physical inspections by authorities. Laine developed and used various machine learning-based classification algorithms, which were able to identify crops relatively well in Finnish conditions.

’The work has already aroused interest in Finland and also elsewhere in Europe following its presentation at the INSPIRE conference. The study has potential for further research and the possibility of further development is being discussed,’ says Laine.

Professor Miina Rautiainen supervised the thesis work, while Jaana Mäkelä of Spatineo served as thesis advisor.

‘The thesis succeeds in its ambitious goal of combining the interpretation of satellite imagery with machine learning. It also has a clear and timely application into practice,’ Rautiainen commented.