FAO GeoNetwork is the spatial data arm of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, and it covers a domain that few other open data portals address with the same global depth: the intersection of agriculture, food security, and natural resources.
While sources like Copernicus or USGS focus on remote sensing imagery, FAO provides the thematic layers that give that imagery meaning in an agricultural context — crop suitability zones, irrigation infrastructure, soil characteristics, water resource basins, and food insecurity indicators, all at sub-national resolution across every country.
The catalog is particularly valuable for work in developing regions where national statistical agencies may not publish openly or where data standards vary widely between countries. FAO harmonizes agricultural and environmental statistics across its member states, so you can compare land use, water stress, or forest loss between countries without reconciling incompatible national datasets.
Flagship products like the Global Agro-Ecological Zones (GAEZ) model and Aquastat water resource database are standard references in climate adaptation planning, agricultural development, and food security research — and they integrate directly with other spatial layers for combined analysis in platforms like Atlas, QGIS, or ArcGIS.
