The air photo dot-count method is now widely and successfully used for esti
mating;operational forest area in the USDA forest Inventory and Analysis (F
IA) program. Possible alternatives that would provide for more frequent upd
ates, spectral change detection, and maps of forest area include the AVHRR
calibration-center technique and various Landsat Thematic Mapper classifica
tion algorithms. Should a switch from proven technology be advised, our gen
eral recommendation is to conduct several pilot studies that would focus on
developing or refining tools and methodologies to allow objective, repeata
ble, and accurate forest area estimation using multi-spectral earth resourc
e satellite data.