DroneForestTrek Project

Guests visited the hyperspectral laboratory, the Educational & Science Center for GIS Technologies, and the Memorial Museum of Alexander Popov. Vice-Rector for International Affairs Anastasia Minina and the head of the Tanzanian delegation, Dr. Celestino Peter Balama emphasized the project win-wins: Russia shares its engineering expertise, while African partners share their experience in the Tanzania's forest ecosystems management

Expert discussion with the participation of Deputy Chairman of the Committee, Dmitry Khaltunen, First Secretary of the Embassy of Tanzania, Semeni Mussa Nandonde, and Director of the Forest Management Department, Evgeny Melnik. Scale of the region and forest monitoring have been discussed.

The delegation saw the entire forest revitalization process: from processing cones and extracting seeds to growing seedlings with a closed root system in automated greenhouses. Over 14 years, 65 million pine and spruce seedlings have been grown here.

Guests saw the full production cycle for civilian drones, CubeSats, and avionics. Geoscan specialists demonstrated multispectral cameras, thermal imagers, and laser scanning technologies. Discussion the AI applications for data processing aroused particular interest. At the testing ground, participants saw aerial photography and magnetic surveying in real time, and some of them launched fixed-wing drones.

The program was concluded in the historical royal Pavlovsk Palace and park. The excursion was organized by the Committee for External Relations of St. Petersburg. Participants discussed cultural heritage as a subject of environmental monitoring and experienced a ride along ancient alleys in a carriage.