<para> A two-step electromagnetic detection procedure is proposed to characterize a dielectric obstacle buried at low depth under a rough surface from single-frequency and multistatic data. First, we have developed, in the framework of the small perturbation theory, a correlation procedure of the scattered field, which enables us to recover an estimation of the roughness profile. This method is tested for various cases with synthetic data provided by a rigorous boundary integral solver. Second, the obtained surface profile is introduced into the numerical simulation due to a finite-element code. An iterative process is then used, based on a level-set formulation, to obtain the shape of the buried target. The influence of the prior step on the accuracy of the reconstruction of the target is studied <emphasis emphasistype="boldital">via</emphasis> various criteria and for different configurations. </para>