Hackathons

COMUNIDAD Hackathon: AI for Environmental Resilience and Sustainable Development - Advancing Innovation in Chilean Patagonia and Colombia’s Coffee Regions

The COMUNIDAD Hackathons are regional innovation challenges designed to harness the power of advanced technologies for sustainable development, climate resilience, and environmental management across Latin America. Hosted in Chile and Colombia, these twin events invite experts in Artificial Intelligence (AI), geospatial technologies, and environmental sciences to co-create impactful digital solutions that address local and regional challenges.

These Hackathons are organised under the COMUNIDAD project, a dynamic initiative aimed at fostering technology transfer and capacity building in Latin America, with a focus on Chile and Colombia. COMUNIDAD integrates cutting-edge tools such as Copernicus satellite data, the European Global Navigation Satellite System (EGNSS), Big Data, numerical modelling, and AI to improve land use practices and promote sustainable agriculture and forestry management.

In Chile:

The hackathon centers on the Chilean Patagonia, with the objective of designing innovative geospatial solutions for environmental management, climate adaptation, and sustainable use of natural resources. Participants will use free data from Sentinel satellites, including Sentinel-1 (radar for detecting changes and deformations), Sentinel-2 (optical imagery for land cover monitoring), Sentinel-3 (temperature and fire detection), and Sentinel-5P (air quality and emissions monitoring). These will be enhanced with local datasets and climate services provided by institutions such as Universidad de Aysén, Universidad de Chile, and regional stakeholders. The goal is to develop solutions that support glacier monitoring, sustainable forestry, and smart agriculture.

In Colombia:

The focus is on strengthening sustainability and security in coffee-growing regions by using AI and satellite data to monitor deforestation and manage climate-related risks. Participants will co-develop applications to identify high-risk zones, enhance land-use planning, and design early warning systems—empowering local communities to mitigate environmental threats and build resilient agroecosystems.

Across both locations, the COMUNIDAD Hackathons promote cross-sector collaboration and the development of open-access technologies to address the region’s most urgent sustainability challenges.

Objectives:

• Foster technological innovation in agriculture, forestry, and environmental management through AI and satellite data.
• Develop digital tools to enhance the efficiency, sustainability, and climate resilience of natural resource use in Chile and Colombia.
• Promote collaboration between scientists, developers, institutions, and local stakeholders.
• Raise awareness of the COMUNIDAD project and its role in advancing open-source, data-driven solutions for sustainable development