WWF – Forest Foresight

In 2018 I worked with WWF (Wereld Natuurfonds in the Netherlands) on a strategic project to look for new opportunities in conservation by leveraging new exciting technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, sensor technologies, drones, blockchain and other recent tech development.

From the first project phase a big opportunities was identified to predict deforestation using Artificial Intelligence. While there are many solutions that take a multi-year view in prediction deforestation, this does not support local law enforcement and tribes in protecting the enormous size of rainforests.

By leveraging multiple data sources a predictive model was created by a team of BCG Gamma consultants that showed the feasibility of predicting deforestation for the next two weeks, rather than in months. On the ground, WWF personnel together with team members of BCG found small scale encroachment by farmers at exactly the locations where the model predicted.

The resulting Forest Foresight model has now been rolled out in multiple countries in five continents.

More information can be found here:

https://www.wwf.nl/wat-we-doen/focus/bossen/forest-foresight-eng

https://www.wwf.nl/globalassets/pdf/forest-foresight/wwf-forest-foresight-prospectus.pdf