OSFAC emerged from the meetings organized in 2000 in Libreville, which brought together representatives of the states of the Congo Forest Basin and agencies in charge of mapping and monitoring plant cover in Central Africa. During this meeting, the participants noted the fact that satellite data and their derivatives played an important role in the effective management of natural resources, but also that there were many constraints of use in the Congo Basin.

The participants then proposed creating OSFAC as a regional forum to overcome the difficulty of data acquisition, the lack of continuing education institutions and the limited capacity to use satellite information. OSFAC was therefore launched as a GOFC-GOLD network for Central Africa under the umbrella of the “Global Terrestrial Observing System” (GTOS).

Its fundamental objectives were to support the management of natural resources and promote sustainable development by producing reliable derivatives of land cover monitoring data, distributing satellite data, building capacity and providing technical assistance in order to make its partners effective.