GeoSutra is a youth-led environmental data company based in Nepal. It brings community and local knowledge together with field science, GIS, mapping, satellites, UAVs and environmental modelling to understand how forests, biodiversity, climate, water and landscapes are changing, and turns that understanding into information people and institutions can act on.

Does GeoSutra replace local knowledge with technology?

No. The people who live with a landscape already know something about it, and that knowledge is where GeoSutra's work begins. Technology adds another layer of observation on top of that knowledge; it does not erase the layers underneath.

How accurate is GeoSutra's tree mapping?

In the Shree Manakamana Community Forest pilot, the reported total is 6,543 crown detections from 4.4 cm UAV imagery; the block sum is 6,309 and reconciliation is pending. The locally retrained model scored 0.73 mAP at IoU 0.50 against hand-annotated reference crowns in one study area. The reference sample size is not recorded and no confidence interval is available. Accuracy is reported per project, never assumed from a previous site.

Are GeoSutra's tools really free?

Yes. Ten forestry calculators and reference databases are available with no sign-up and no paywall. Every tool publishes its formula, sources, assumptions and limitations.

Who owns the data GeoSutra collects?

The commissioning organisation owns its project data. Where a dataset can safely be public, such as the Nuwakot flood imagery, GeoSutra releases it openly with attribution. Sensitive and community information is handled under the data governance commitments published on the Approach page.

GeoSutra | Local knowledge. New ways of seeing. Environmental data for Nepal

Why we exist

The landscape doesn't stand still.

The place

People know their places.

Seasons, forests, wildlife, water, soil, grazing, fire, regeneration. Local knowledge is the foundation. It becomes even more valuable connected with new evidence about a changing landscape.

The change

But the landscape is changing.

Climate change, biodiversity loss, land-use change, disasters, water stress, shifting species, fire, development pressure. What took generations to learn can now change in a season.

The technology

Maps have never been neutral.

Remote sensing and spatial technology have served extraction and land acquisition. We believe they can serve the people who live with a landscape: to understand it, document it, protect it and decide.

Local knowledge remains essential, and it needs new evidence beside it. So we listen to the place, the people and the question; we map it with the smallest useful combination of fieldwork, GIS, drones, satellites and analysis; and we return the result to the people and institutions who need it. We measure it for you, with you. Our approach →

What we have built

Built in Nepal, from the field up.

We build our own tools so that local knowledge, field evidence and environmental data can meet in one place. Two are live today. One is still being built, and we say so plainly.

Live · open to explore

Himalayan Observatory

See environmental change across Nepal.

An interactive map of all 753 local governments, bringing together tree cover and loss, climate, fire detections and reported disasters. Every number carries its source, method and limitations.

Who it helps: Communities, local governments, researchers, planners and NGOs asking where, and how fast, a place is changing.
Why it matters: Environmental information is scattered across reports and portals. The Observatory puts it on one map, with its limits stated.
How to use it: The map and boundaries are open to everyone. Data layers, analysis, reports and downloads are available to approved accounts.

Open the Observatory Ask for an account →

GeoSutra Field on an Android phone: a survey task assigned from the Observatory, open offline, with a button to take a GPS fix and the first survey questions. — A survey assigned from the Observatory, open offline on the phone.

Live · Android, 1.0.0 Early Access

GeoSutra Field

Collect evidence where there is no signal.

An Android app for field surveys and evidence. Forms, GPS fixes and photographs are recorded on the phone without a connection, kept safe, and sent when a connection returns.

Who it helps: Forest user groups, field teams, surveyors and researchers working where signal is weak or absent.
Why it matters: Field evidence is often lost between the notebook and the report. Field keeps each record, its location and its photographs together, with checksums so they can be traced.
How to use it: Download the Early Access build for Android 10 or newer. Projects and surveys are set up in the Observatory by approved accounts.

Download for Android Enquire about a field project →

Working now internal prototype

Answers only from pages it has retrieved, with numbered citations
Checks the numbers in its answer against the cited pages
Declines to answer when it cannot ground one
Runs on our own hardware

Still being built

Public access and a hosted service
Connection to Observatory and Field project records
Permissions, so each organisation sees only its own records
Published accuracy tests and limits

In development · not yet public

GeoSutra AI

Ask the research, with the sources in view.

A research assistant for questions about Nepal's environment. It answers from a curated library of open-access research and shows the pages it used, so you can check it.

Who it will help: Researchers, planners and field teams who need to find what the evidence says, quickly and with sources.
Why it matters: Useful research is hard to find and harder to trust. An answer that cannot show its source is not an answer.
How to get involved: It is not available to the public yet. If you work on Nepal's environment and would like to help test it, tell us.

How it works, and where it stands Help us test it →

Designed to work together. The Observatory and Field are already connected: a project and survey published in the Observatory reach the phone, and the evidence collected comes back to the Observatory (tested end to end in October 2026, during Early Access). GeoSutra AI is not yet connected to either. We will say so here when it is.

How it fits together

More ways of knowing. One living landscape.

None of these layers tells the whole story alone.

01Community knowledgeKnowledge
02Field observationsKnowledge
03Historical records & community forest dataKnowledge
04GISField
05Satellite imageryTechnology
06UAV imageryTechnology
07Environmental modelsTechnology
08AI / analyticsTechnology
09Shared environmental pictureTogether

What we can do for you

Four ways to work with GeoSutra.

Organisations pay us for professional services, environmental intelligence and technical systems. That is what lets us keep selected tools, datasets and learning resources open to communities, students, researchers and the public. Tell us the place and the decision, and we will say what fits.

Environmental intelligence software and data

Use the Himalayan Observatory, Climate Analytics and GeoSutra Field, and the datasets and free tools we release.

Ask about access →

Fieldwork and environmental studies

Forest inventory, biodiversity, water and landscape studies, and environmental assessments (EIA, IEE and BES), designed with the people who know the place.

Plan a study →

Environmental monitoring and decision support

Rapid mapping after disasters, hazard mapping and recovery GIS, and monitoring of change that supports a decision.

Talk about monitoring →

Custom research and technical systems

Spatial databases, remote sensing, dashboards and monitoring systems built around your question, and research partnerships.

Describe your problem →

Scopes and packages are on the Services page. We do not publish a price list; every project is scoped with you.

What we help people understand

Forests, water, wildlife, people.

Tree crowns detected over Shree Manakamana orthomosaic

ForestsHealth, inventory, regeneration, management, change

Disaster & resilienceRapid mapping, damage, hazard, recovery

Swamp deer stags in tall grassland, photographed by Kirtan Pandit

BiodiversitySpecies, habitat, connectivity Climate & environmental performance →

Water & landscapesWatersheds, land-use change, water systems

Samikshya Basnet presenting a Save The Frogs Day session to a school hall of students

Training & learningMap your school. Map your forest.

What we have accomplished

You cannot understand a forest by counting trees alone.

A forest is biodiversity, livelihood, water, soil, wildlife, climate resilience, culture, food, shade, memory. We count trees because trees matter. But we also sit on porches, walk transects, paddle rivers and ask people what they have seen change.

Handover at the Division Forest Office, Nawalpur

Shree Manakamana CF · Kawasoti

A forest, seen stem by stem.

The user group knew the forest. What was missing was a repeatable spatial picture. UAV + field plots + GIS + crown detection came back as information for the people managing it.

6,543 crown detections4.4 cm GSD0.73 mAP

Widened Trishuli channel through Nuwakot after the flood

Trishuli corridor · Nuwakot

Sometimes the landscape changes overnight.

When it does, environmental information has to move just as quickly. See the Nuwakot response →

16 frames<24 hopen data

6,543reported crown detections in one community forest (provisional)

<24hfrom the Trishuli flood to our first flight

10free tools, each showing its formula

753local governments with climate data

Manakamana pilot: reported 6,543 crown detections; block sum 6,309. Reconciliation pending. Detections are not a tree census; evaluation covers one site, with reference sample size unrecorded and no confidence interval.

Every number traces to a plot, a flight or a cited dataset. How we know →

Built as a company. Designed to create public value.

Environmental knowledge should not always sit behind a paywall.

Organisations pay us for professional services, environmental intelligence and technical systems. That lets us keep selected tools, datasets, learning resources and environmental information accessible to communities, students, researchers and the public.

Free tools Open data Information hub

Sample plots Tree density Biomass Log volume NDVI Ropani ↔ hectare Species NTFP prices All 10 →

Every tool shows what it does, who it is for, its formula, sources, assumptions, limits and when not to use it.

The people