Hi Tech sky spy to verify EU farm subsidy - Lo tech computer system should pay, won't pay.

UK Environment Secretary Margaret Beckett in a written statement today finally admitted that the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) would fail to meet the EU-wide subsidy payment deadline of the end of June and announced that she had authorised the making of "substantial" partial ( >80%) settlements, around 80 per cent of the full value, in the meantime.

Tory Shadow Farms Minister Jim Paice asked: "How much will the Government's failure to make payments before the EU deadline end up costing British taxpayers in penalties?"

The latest official figures show only 24%– £362m – of the £1.5bn farm payment fund has been allocated, leaving 61% – > 70,000 farmers – are still waiting for their cheques.

After such incompetence, bungling, stupidity, waste of money (.. and God knows how many millions) it is a leap from the ridiculous to the sublime to read how the EU verifies farm subsidies.

GeoEye, the world's largest satellite remote-sensing imaging company and its partner European Space Imaging (EUSI) (largest suppliers of commercial satellite imagery to the European Commission) has received an additional contract ( EUR 1.8Mn) from the European Commission to supply OrbView-3 high-resolution map-accurate imagery.

As a sinister footnote they add, the European Commission will use OrbView-3 imagery in support of national security related projects.

OrbView-3 has been used by several Asian countries as well as by the US Government's National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency for similar purposes.

All OrbView imagery is currently down-linked, processed and shipped from St. Louis, Missouri, and all IKONOS operations are conducted from Thornton, Colorado.

IKONOS was launched September 24, 1999 from Space Launch Complex 6 (SLC-6) at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California it has a polar, circular, sun-synchronous 681-km orbit and both sensors have a swath width of 11 km. Its weight is 1600 pounds (720 kg).

GeoEye is currently building its next-generation commercial satellite imaging system, GeoEye-1, which will have a ground resolution of .41-meter panchromatic (IKONOS = 1 m) and 1.65-meter multispectral (IKONOS = 4 m). When launched in early 2007, this satellite will greatly increase the capacity to collect a large amount of data within a short timeframe, which is ideal for monitoring the crop subsidy programs.

If you want to see the quality images available click on these and zoom as required. Breathtaking ... these images were taken from 681 Km above the Earth !!!

London Millenium Dome
Paris, France. Eiffel Tower
Ghardaia, Algeria

Ghardaia, imbedded in the valley of the M'Zab wadi in the North of the Algerian Sahara, is the most significant of five oasis cities successively built starting in the early 11th century by M'Zabite Berbers

Frankfurt, Airport