Nature has always been perceived by human beings not only as the essential source for their own survival and evolution, but also, at the same time, as an irrational, fascinating and destructive power. For humankind, the opportunity to exploit nature to obtain food and essential resources for its life collides with the risk that such actions will cause an unstoppable impoverishment of the latter. Today, technology provides new tools to improve the coexistence between man and nature, favouring a more virtuous relationship between humankind and the environment of which it is part.
The 12 satellite and aerial images, produced and processed by e-GEOS in this calendar, show the not always comfortable nature of the humankind-nature relationship. These are images of extraordinary beauty that allow you to make a virtual flight above our planet: from the water basins of the Val Formazza, between Italy and Switzerland, to the vineyards of the island of Lanzarote, in the Canaries; from the Verrazzano bridge, in New York, to the mountain terraces in Yuangyang, China; from the Northwest Passage, in Siberia, to Flevoland, in the Netherlands; from the Panama Canal to the artificial island that hosts the Osaka airport, in Japan; from the "plastic sea" of El Ejido, in Almeria, to Lake Chad, in Africa; from the "solar ranch" of the California Valley to the submerged archaeological city of Pozzuoli, a few kilometres from Naples.
Persisting in a policy of attention to environmental sustainability and social responsibility issues that Leonardo, Telespazio and e-GEOS have been carrying out since 2007 with the Love Planet Earth project, a tree has been planted for each printed copy of this calendar. In fact, thanks to an agreement signed by e-GEOS with Tree-Nation Project, 6,500 trees have been planted in the village of Sai, in the state of Maharashtra (India), with the aim of favouring the feeding of underground water basins, reducing flooding, fighting the effects of soil erosion, improving the habitat of wildlife and providing fruits, forages and forest products to the local community.
In the coming years e-GEOS will be able, with the help of the COSMO-SkyMed radar satellites and through the optical data coming from other satellites, to monitor the area in which the trees have been planted, and to communicate the state of growth of this new forest.
The calendar is printed on paper certified by the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) program, which certifies the sustainable management of forests.