Title: Background for AFIS, the Annual Forrest Inventory System

Author: McRoberts, Ronald E.

Year: 2000

Publication: In: McRoberts, Ronald E.; Reams, Gregory A.; Van Deusen, Paul C., eds. Proceedings of the First Annual Forest Inventory and Analysis Symposium; Gen. Tech. Rep. NC-213. St. Paul, MN: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, North Central Research Station: 1-4

Abstract: The Annual Forest Inventory System. AFIS, was jointly proposed and developed in the early 1990s by the Forest Inventory and Analysis programs of the North Central and Rocky Mountain Research Stations of the USDA Forest Service and the Forestry Division of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. The objective of AFIS was to establish the capability of producing standard statewide inventory estimates on an annual basis. The context in which AFIS was proposed was defined by two crucial constraints: the average annual cost could be no greater than that of periodic inventories and the precision of estimates could be no less than that obtained from periodic inventories. The system designed to achieve the objective while simultaneously satisfying the constraints included an annual sample of measured field plots, satellite-based remote sensing for area estimation and vegetation change detection, growth and mortality models for updating plots measured in previous years, and computerized databases of field plot information.