The Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment has put together a series of maps showing the effects humans are having on the landscape of the world. Data sets include population, land area, cropland area, major crops and land suitability. Interestingly, cropland area is available for various years back to 1770.

Registration is required to access the data. A gridded ASCII file will result in a php file that is viewable in an Internet browser. The resolution is not the finest (0.5 degrees).

Read the news release.