The aim of the research was to identify the change of abandoned lands in Ūdrija cadastral area of Alytus district. This particular area was selected due to the diversity of land cover objects and because of a good agrarian condition. According to the data of 2010, the cadastral area of Ūdrija had 176 plots of abandoned land with the total area of 61.41 ha. After the verification 179 plots of a land were found, with the total area of 62.84 ha. It can be said that there is a minor increasing tendency of abandoned lands. During field verification as many as 41 mismatches were identified. The mismatch of the data was influenced by two main factors: a two year period between the information of the data set and field verification, as well as errors of the data set. To sum up, the information of verification has changed slightly. It happened because some mismatches were positive (identified new areas of abandoned land), while others were negative (plots of land which were in a set of data were denied during the verification).

The latest land reform in Latvia has substantially altered the structure of use of farmland leading to a great number of very small and fragmented agricultural holdings, yet, in terms of occupied total area and UAA, medium size (10.0-50.0 ha) and slightly larger (more than 50.0 ha) land holdings dominate. In Latvia the number of agricultural holdings tends to decline. On the contrary, the average UAA per agricultural holding rose (by 66%), reaching 23.2 ha in 2010. One can conclude that positive structural changes take place in the agricultural industry – the number of small farms has declined and the number of and the area farmed by large marketoriented farms has risen, thus the difference between the sizes of land holdings that emerged during the land reform and the land areas farmed by agricultural holdings has increased.

Peculiarities of farming land usage in southern Lithuania are analyzed in the article. The analysis of archival data and cartographical material reflecting the structure of farming land in Marijampolė, Šakiai, Kazlų Rūda, Alytus, Lazdijai and Vilkaviškis municipalities was accomplished. Information was taken from yearbooks and archives of public institutions of the Republic of Lithuania and other sources as well. It was determined after analysis of collected information that usage and location of cultivated land greatly depend on the land’s productivity. The largest amount of undeclared farming land is in the districts where the land less favourable for farming is dominant. The analysis of the period of last 10 years has shown that the area of farming land decreased by 753 ha in Lazdijai district and by 194 ha in Vilkaviškis district, but increased by 5.5 ha in Alytus district on average per annum.

The article deals with land consolidation solutions in three rural territories of Latvia, creating perspective monolithic land plots in order to prevent land fragmentation and improve the structure of land properties. Although all three project territories are located in geographically analogical circumstances, established structure of land properties, their infrastructure and location in relation to Riga and other cities and towns prescribes different objectives of land consolidation. The proposed land consolidation methodology could be powerful tool in hands of local municipalities in order to promote development of to rural area in general, agriculture and other sectors.

At the moment all three Baltic countries – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – use Baltic Normal Height System 1977 as a national height system. But the European Union regulations declared the European Vertical Reference System as a national height system. For height transformation there is a transformation formula for each European country. After calculations it is seen that height difference between Baltic Normal Height System 1977 and the European Vertical Reference System depends on point location in the territory (coordinates). This unequal height difference between both height systems will cause unequal height values on border connection points between the Baltic countries.

The development of GIS technologies, of Earth remote sensing methods, improvement of the legal basis, as well as differences in approaches of creation and functioning of the cadastral systems puts on the agenda the task of using a unified methodological approach for the creation of the cadastral systems. It is particularly relevant during the period of integration and globalization of economic, sociopolitical, scientific and cultural, educational and other programs of different countries and, especially, of the countries of the European Union. The purpose of this research is to attempt to improve the structure of cadastral system with regard to land parcels registration outlining the main directions of scientific and practical research meant for the modernization of the cadastre. The results of the research are suggestions and recommendations about the possibility of creating a unified register of cadastral objects, land parcels in particular, as well as the list of scientific tasks aimed at the modernization and improvement of the cadastral system. The conclusions show that the cadastre should be regarded as the state informational and registration system of geospatial position of the objects, their quantitative and qualitative assessment and legal status at this stage of development of technical, techno-logical and legal trends. In a scientific sense, the cadastre is a branch of science which studies the patterns and principles of formation, functioning and preservation of cadastral objects, information about them and their register.

The main reason of land fragmentation in Latvia was the restitution of ownership rights to former landowners or their heirs, as well as the land acquisition by other persons in the process of the land reform. As a result the ownership structure was obtained which is not competitive in the aspect of production efficiency. Different instruments as land consolidation, land reallotment and others can be applied for the reduction of land fragmentation. The reduction of land fragmentation should play an essential role in the use of the land corresponding to the spatial development plans which determines perspective land use. Therefore the improvement of the ownership structure should be one of the stages of land use planning.

Along with the development of the technological possibilities, the Global Positioning Satellite System (GNSS) is increasingly used in geodetic measurements. Using GNSS, measurements are performed in horizontal plane as well as for point elevation determination. The aim of the article is to demonstrate that the GNSS measurements’ static mode has a high accuracy. To achieve the aim the following objectives were set: 1) to perform global positioning measurements in Class I national leveling network, 2) to calculate the elevation above the sea level, 3) to evaluate the accuracy of performed GNSS measurements. The following research methods were used: static measurement method and analytical method for comparison of the obtained data.