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In many computer vision tasks, for example saliency prediction or semantic segmentation, the desired output is a foreground map that predicts pixels where some criteria is satisfied. Despite the inherently spatial nature of this task…
High-resolution daytime satellite imagery has become a promising source to study economic activities. These images display detailed terrain over large areas and allow zooming into smaller neighborhoods. Existing methods, however, have…
Accurate, fine-grained poverty maps remain scarce across much of the Global South. While Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) provide high-quality socioeconomic data, their spatial coverage is limited and reported coordinates are randomly…
Artificial Intelligence (AI) presents opportunities to develop tools and techniques for addressing some of the major global challenges and deliver solutions with significant social and economic impacts. The application of AI has…
The integration of remote sensing and machine learning in agriculture is transforming the industry by providing insights and predictions through data analysis. This combination leads to improved yield prediction and water management,…
To achieve sustainable development worldwide, the United Nations set 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for humanity to reach by 2030. Society is involved in the challenge, with firms playing a crucial role. Thus, a key question is to…
Earth observation (EO) data such as satellite imagery can have far-reaching impacts on our understanding of the geography of poverty, especially when coupled with machine learning (ML) and computer vision. Early research used computer…
Foundation Models (FMs) are large-scale, pre-trained artificial intelligence (AI) systems that have revolutionized natural language processing and computer vision, and are now advancing geospatial analysis and Earth Observation (EO). They…
In many regions of the world, sparse data on key economic outcomes inhibits the development, targeting, and evaluation of public policy. We demonstrate how advancements in satellite imagery and machine learning can help ameliorate these…
Combining satellite imagery with machine learning (SIML) has the potential to address global challenges by remotely estimating socioeconomic and environmental conditions in data-poor regions, yet the resource requirements of SIML limit its…
Earth observation (EO), aiming at monitoring the state of planet Earth using remote sensing data, is critical for improving our daily lives and living environment. With a growing number of satellites in orbit, an increasing number of…
With exponential growth in the human population, it is vital to conserve natural resources without compromising on producing enough food to feed everyone. Doing so can improve people's livelihoods, health, and ecosystems for the present and…
Investing in children and youth is a critical step towards inclusive, equitable, and sustainable development for current and future generations. Several international agendas for accomplishing common global goals emphasize the need for…
Ending poverty in all its forms everywhere is the number one Sustainable Development Goal of the UN 2030 Agenda. To monitor the progress towards such an ambitious target, reliable, up-to-date and fine-grained measurements of socioeconomic…
Poverty statistics guide social policy, but in many low- and middle-income countries, censuses and household surveys that collect these data are costly, infrequent, quickly outdated, and sometimes error-prone. Satellite imagery offers…
This study assessed the effectiveness of machine learning models in predicting poverty levels in the Philippines using five boosting algorithms: Adaptive Boosting (AdaBoost), CatBoosting (CatBoost), Gradient Boosting Machine (GBM), Light…
The use of Deep Learning (DL) algorithms has improved the performance of vision-based space applications in recent years. However, generating large amounts of annotated data for training these DL algorithms has proven challenging. While…
Can mobile phone data improve program targeting? By combining rich survey data from a "big push" anti-poverty program in Afghanistan with detailed mobile phone logs from program beneficiaries, we study the extent to which machine learning…
Sustainable global development is one of the most prevalent challenges facing the world today, hinging on the equilibrium between socioeconomic growth and environmental sustainability. We propose approaches to monitor and quantify…
Using synthetic data for training deep neural networks for robotic manipulation holds the promise of an almost unlimited amount of pre-labeled training data, generated safely out of harm's way. One of the key challenges of synthetic data,…