The problem of abandoned agricultural land is relevant in Lithuania, particularly in the territories where poor soils are dominant. The aim of this research is to analyze the statistics of abandoned land in poor soil regions by different estimation methods. The abandoned land was registered for the purposes of the research. Areas might be determined by using statistical data and by applying the results of a distant research method. The initially obtained data showed large differences among the areas of abandoned land determined by different calculation methods, and this might cause a lot of problems, in particular when clarifying the validity of the land taxation. Therefore the initial data of the research concerning abandoned land should be essentially revised. The results of abandoned land accounting and evaluation (inventory) in each territory should be checked and confirmed by the committee of qualified specialists. The reasons of abandonment should be determined for each land plot, and further use of the plot should be determined. Plots of abandoned agricultural land should be estimated for each parcel of the private land and registered in the cadastre data as additional information for estimation of the land tax.

Land degradation is a topical issue not only in Latvia, but also in Europe. Even the real estate additional tax rate of 1.5% does not prevent agricultural land from overgrowing, and there is no other legal mechanism to control it. One of the mechanisms of prevention of land degradation process is reconstruction of drainage systems, change of worthless agricultural land (less than 25 points) to forest land or improvement and return of agricultural land (more than 25 points) to economic production. Although such actions require financial resources, there may be a variety of financial support programs, for example, the decrease of the real property tax rate (in case of afforestation).

Starting in 2016, the process of financial decentralization began in Ukraine, in which local governments of lower levels (rural, urban, city councils and united territorial communities) were entitled to independently establish on their territory the rates of many local taxes and fees credited to community budgets. In particular, tax legislation of Ukraine allows local governments to vary land tax rates in the range from 0.1 to 3% of the normative monetary valuation of land, as well as to differentiate tax rates depending on the type of intended use of land plots. The study created a database and analysed the spatial heterogeneity of land tax rates in more than 9.6 thousand communities. It is shown how the level of tax burden on land owners and land users, established by local self-government bodies, correlates with the economic development of the regions, as well as the normative monetary valuation of land, which is used in Ukraine as a tax base. The problems of taxation of real estate, which arise at the separate collection of land tax and tax for real property other than land, are considered, as well as suggestions on the necessity of introduction of tax zoning of territories in Ukraine, which will allow to further differentiate the rates of taxes on the property and provide more flexible and adaptive taxation of real estate.

For millennia, the geodesic industry has improved methods and technologies for obtaining information on the location of objects on the Earth's surface, whose key task has been to improve the accuracy and reliability of measurements. At the same time, in recent decades, the rapid development of positioning technologies based on satellite radio navigation systems has created prerequisites for a situation where the acceptable accuracy of determining the geodetic characteristics of real estate becomes quite affordable even when using non-specialized geodetic equipment, including personal mobile devices. The article shows that the error in determining the area of land for registration of rights to real estate has its own “costˮ, which depends on the value of real estate in the area of survey. By the example of model sites, it is shown that further improvement of the accuracy of engineering surveying to determine the spatial characteristics of real estate objects would be economically feasible only if the cost of geodetic surveys (including the cost of purchasing new geodetic equipment, payment for labour of specially trained engineers, additional technical services and etc.) will not exceed the “cost of errorˮ to determine the area of the site. Using the example of Ukraine, it is shown that the most accurate geodetic surveys (determining turning points of land borders with an accuracy of more than 0.02 m) are economically feasible only when the market value of a land plot exceeds USD 208 per square meter.

The article describes peculiarities of formation of the estimated constituent in the structure of the state land cadastre in Ukraine. The author gives analysis of the current Ukrainian practice of consideration of the intended use of a land plot while making normative monetary evaluation of non-agricultural land plots within and outside settlements. The conducted analysis of the methodology of normative monetary evaluation of the land of settlements and non-agricultural land outside the settlements confirms that in the process of evaluation, each of the methodologies considers the intended use of land plots in a different way, causing different value correlation between the lands of different categories and kinds of intended use. Differentiation of the estimated indices of the methodology of normative monetary evaluation of non-agricultural lands within and outside settlements absolutely disagree with one another. The article supplies conclusions on the necessity to transfer to a consistent approach of such differentiation without reference to the land plot location within or outside the settlements. Basing on the analysis of statistical information on the sale of state- and communally-owned lands, the author defines the coefficients of correlation between the sale price of state- and communally-owned lands in 2017−2018 in Ukraine in terms of the kinds of intended use and the figures of the indices of differentiation of normative monetary evaluation of non-agricultural lands within and outside settlements depending on the intended use of the land plot. The author proposes changes to the approaches to differentiation of the indices of evaluation of the lands of different intended use on the base of market prices. The work also outlines the main problems and possible directions of transition to a large-scale evaluation of lands in Ukraine.

The main factors that influence the rational land use, conservation and protection of land resources are global ecological and food security, world's population growth, climate change, land acquisition by large world agricultural corporations etc. In this process a priority of attention is protection of the important agricultural lands (in Ukraine, these lands are called especially valuable lands - EVL). Besides, lands with highly productive soils, areas with undisturbed ecosystems, territories with objects of cultural heritage, natural therapeutic resources are a part of EVL. This paper focuses on new approaches to the legal protection of EVL in Ukraine. The special value of these lands in Ukraine is legalized and is means of their legal protection (Art. 150 of the Land Code of Ukraine). The main idea of this paper – studying of problems of legal protection of EVL and development of new approaches to their protection. These approaches will be based on introduction of economic regulators at withdrawal of EVL or change their intended use for needs that don't correspond to nature protection value. The reseach is based on case study method and statistical method. Approaches for cartographic modeling for assessment and mapping of EVL are offered. Results of this reseach are an obtaining of practical experience in the field of protection of EVL in Ukraine, development of suggestions for improving of an organizational and legal mechanism the use of EVL through their registration, monitoring, evaluation, development of their State Register. These measures can increase competitiveness of EVL, prevent Land-Grabbing and provide sustainable development of the rural territory.

Land degradation is one of the most pressing problems ensuring sustainable use of land. In order to provide a clear understanding of land degradation and its risks, as well as to implement unified measures for prevention of land degradation in Latvia, the Land Management Law came into force in 2015. It individually defines the concepts of land and soil degradation, thus separating them from each other, as well as clarifying the term “degraded territory”. However, despite these solutions in the regulatory framework of the land degradation, till now criteria for identifying land degradation have not been developed and approved, therefore their determination is very subjective and not comparable between municipalities and at the state level. The aim of the article is to develop and approbate degradation criteria for assessing land degradation in particular territory. In the article, based on the author's previous studies on the classification of land degradation, characterised one type of land degradation – the abandoned agricultural and forestry activity territory, as well as proposed subdivision of criteria classification into three levels – low, medium and high. As result of the study, it was concluded that the classification of degraded territories into three degradation levels is justified for the purpose of more objective identification and evaluation of land degradation.