Satellite-based models have been widely used to simulate vegetation gross primary production (GPP) at the site, regional, or global scales in recent years. However, accurately reproducing the interannual variations in GPP remains a major challenge, and the long-term changes in GPP remain highly uncertain. In this study, we generated a long-term global GPP dataset at 0.05^∘ latitude by 0.05^∘ longitude and 8 d interval by revising a light use efficiency model (i.e., EC-LUE model). In the revised EC-LUE model, we integrated the regulations of several major environmental variables: atmospheric CO₂ concentration, radiation components, and atmospheric vapor pressure deficit (VPD). These environmental variables showed substantial long-term changes, which could greatly impact the global vegetation productivity. Eddy covariance (EC) measurements at 95 towers from the FLUXNET2015 dataset, covering nine major ecosystem types around the globe, were used to calibrate and validate the model. In general, the revised EC-LUE model could effectively reproduce the spatial, seasonal, and annual variations in the tower-estimated GPP at most sites. The revised EC-LUE model could explain 71 % of the spatial variations in annual GPP over 95 sites. At more than 95 % of the sites, the correlation coefficients (R²) of seasonal changes between tower-estimated and model-simulated GPP are larger than 0.5. Particularly, the revised EC-LUE model improved the model performance in reproducing the interannual variations in GPP, and the averaged R² between annual mean tower-estimated and model-simulated GPP is 0.44 over all 55 sites with observations longer than 5 years, which is significantly higher than those of the original EC-LUE model (R²=0.36) and other LUE models (R² ranged from 0.06 to 0.30 with an average value of 0.16). At the global scale, GPP derived from light use efficiency models, machine learning models, and process-based biophysical models shows substantial differences in magnitude and interannual variations. The revised EC-LUE model quantified the mean global GPP from 1982 to 2017 as 106.2±2.9 Pg C yr⁻¹ with the trend 0.15 Pg C yr⁻¹. Sensitivity analysis indicated that GPP simulated by the revised EC-LUE model was sensitive to atmospheric CO₂ concentration, VPD, and radiation. Over the period of 1982–2017, the CO₂ fertilization effect on the global GPP (0.22±0.07 Pg C yr⁻¹) could be partly offset by increased VPD ($-\mathrm{0.17}\pm \mathrm{0.06}$ Pg C yr⁻¹). The long-term changes in the environmental variables could be well reflected in global GPP. Overall, the revised EC-LUE model is able to provide a reliable long-term estimate of global GPP. The GPP dataset is available at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.8942336.v3 (Zheng et al., 2019).

Although China is the largest producer of rice, accounting for about 25% of global production, there are no high-resolution maps of paddy rice covering the entire country. Using time-weighted dynamic time warping (TWDTW), this study developed a pixel- and phenology-based method to identify planting areas of double-season paddy rice in China, by comparing temporal variations of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) signals of unknown pixels to those of known double-season paddy rice fields. We conducted a comprehensive evaluation of the method’s performance at pixel and regional scales. Based on 145,210 field surveyed samples from 2018 to 2020, the producer’s and user’s accuracy are 88.49% and 87.02%, respectively. Compared to county-level statistical data from 2016 to 2019, the relative mean absolute errors are 34.11%. This study produced distribution maps of double-season rice at 10 m spatial resolution from 2016 to 2020 over nine provinces in South China, which account for more than 99% of the planting areas of double-season paddy rice of China. The maps are expected to contribute to timely monitoring and evaluating rice growth and yield.

Paddy rice is the second-largest grain crop in China and plays an important role in ensuring global food security. However, there is no high-resolution map of rice covering all of China. This study developed a new rice-mapping method by combining optical and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images in cloudy areas based on the time-weighted dynamic time warping (TWDTW) method and produced distribution maps of single-season rice in 21 provincial administrative regions of China from 2017 to 2022 at a 10 or 20 m resolution. The accuracy was examined using 108 195 survey samples and county-level statistical data. On average, the user's, producer's, and overall accuracy values over all investigated provincial administrative regions were 73.08 %, 82.81 %, and 85.23 %, respectively. Compared with the statistical data from 2017 to 2019, the distribution maps explained 83 % of the spatial variation of county-level planting areas on average. The distribution maps can be obtained at https://doi.org/10.57760/sciencedb.06963 (Shen et al., 2023).

China is the world’s second-largest maize producer, contributing 23% to global production and playing a crucial role in stabilizing the global maize supply. Therefore, accurately mapping the maize distribution in China is of great significance for regional and global food security and international cereals trade. However, it still lacks a long-term maize distribution dataset with fine spatial resolution, because the existing high spatial resolution satellite datasets suffer from data gaps caused by cloud cover, especially in humid and cloudy regions. This study aimed to produce a long-term, high-resolution maize distribution map for China (China Crop Dataset–Maize, CCD-Maize) identifying maize in 22 provinces and municipalities from 2001 to 2020. The map was produced using a high spatiotemporal resolution fused dataset and a phenology-based method called Time-Weighted Dynamic Time Warping. A validation based on 54,281 field survey samples with a 30-m resolution showed that the average user’s accuracy and producer’s accuracy of CCD-Maize were 77.32% and 80.98%, respectively, and the overall accuracy was 80.06% over all 22 provinces.

As the second largest producer of maize, China contributes 23% of global maize production and plays an important role in guaranteeing maize markets stability. In spite of its importance, there is no 30 m spatial resolution distribution map of maize for all of China. This study used a time-weighted dynamic time warping method to identify planting areas of maize by comparing the similarity of time series of a satellite-based vegetation index at each pixel with a standard time series derived from known maize fields and mapped maize distribution from 2016 to 2020 over 22 provinces accounting for more than 99% of the maize planting area in China. Based on 18800 field-surveyed pixels at 30-meter spatial resolution, the distribution map yields 76.15% and 81.59% of producer’s and user’s accuracies averaged over the entire investigated provinces, respectively. Municipality- and county-level census data also show a good performance in reproducing the spatial distribution of maize. This study provides an approach to mapping maize over large areas based on a small volume of field survey data.