Sumit Mishra writes in Mint on using data from satellite images to estimate the level of economic activity in regions.

“Night-time lights or night-lights data contain the data on energy emitted or reflected back from the surface of the earth to the sky. Economists figured that this data tends to correlate with economic activity. Thus, for countries with poor data, night-lights data has been particularly useful in estimating the level of economic activity and gross domestic product (GDP). A classic example is Myanmar, which stopped publishing its national accounts statistics in 1989.

Using night-lights data, economists have shown that the country’s economy is growing at a very slow pace. A 2012 research paper by the Japan-based think-tank IDE-JETRO used night-lights data to show that most economic activity is concentrated in regions surrounding the capital Yangon. Also, the regions bordering China and Thailand grew at much faster pace than those bordering Bangladesh and India, the study suggests.”

Read the full article here.

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