The Land use of Australia 2010-11 is the latest in a series of digital national land use maps at national scale. Agricultural land uses and their spatial distributions are based on the Australian Bureau of Statistics' 2010-11 agricultural census data. The spatial distribution of the agricultural land uses is modelled and was determined using Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) satellite imagery with training data to make agricultural land use allocations. The non-agricultural land uses are drawn from existing digital maps covering seven themes: topographic features, catchment scale land use, protected areas, World Heritage Areas, tenure, forest type and vegetation condition.
The Land use of Australia 2010-11 is a product of the Australian Collaborative Land Use and Management Program (ACLUMP). ACLUMP, coordinated by ABARES, is a collaborative cross-government approach producing land use mapping products for Australia underpinned by common technical standards. The Department of Agriculture and Water Resources is acknowledged for its financial support of the Land use of Australia 2010-11.
The Land Use of Australia datasets are recognised as Foundation Spatial Data by the Australia New Zealand Land Information Council and as an Essential Statistical Asset for Australia by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Common applications of the datasets are in strategic planning and continental modelling.