LUCAS is the acronym of L and U se and C over A rea frame S urvey.

The aim of the LUCAS survey is to gather harmonised information on land cover, land use and environmental parameters. The survey also provides territorial information to analyse the interactions between agriculture, environment and countryside, such as irrigation and land management.

From 2006 to 2018, EUROSTAT has carried out LUCAS surveys every three years. 2006 data is considered pilot and has not been used to produce estimates. The most recent surveys happened in the spring-summer of 2009, 2012, 2015, 2018 and 2022.

Since the LUCAS surveys are carried out in-situ, this means that observations are made and registered on the ground by field surveyors. A mixed panel approach is used, so some points are visited in subsequent years.

In the field, the surveyor classifies the land cover and the visible land use according to the harmonized LUCAS Survey land cover and land use classifications. Landscape pictures are taken in the four cardinal directions. Till 2015 a transect of 250m was walked from the point to the east direction, where the surveyor records all transitions of land cover and existing linear features. The above-mentioned transect was not surveyed during the 2018 survey and in 2022 a landscape feature module was introduced instead, to assess agricultural landscapes. A specific topsoil module was implemented in 2009, in 2012 (partly), in 2015, in 2018 and in 2022.