Land-Cover and Land-Use Changes in Eastern Europe after the Collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-viii

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2. Introduction

   • V. C. Radeloff, G. Gutman

   Pages 1-11

3. Overview of Changes in Land Use and Land Cover in Eastern Europe

   • Jan Feranec, Tomas Soukup, Gregory N. Taff, Premysl Stych, Ivan Bicik

   Pages 13-33

4. Lighting Tracks Transition in Eastern Europe

   • C. D. Elvidge, F.-C. Hsu, K. E. Baugh, T. Ghosh

   Pages 35-56

5. Land Change in the Carpathian Region Before and After Major Institutional Changes

   • Catalina Munteanu, Volker Radeloff, Patrick Griffiths, Lubos Halada, Dominik Kaim, Jan Knorn et al.

   Pages 57-90

6. Underlying Drivers and Spatial Determinants of post-Soviet Agricultural Land Abandonment in Temperate Eastern Europe

   • Alexander V. Prishchepov, Daniel Müller, Matthias Baumann, Tobias Kuemmerle, Camilo Alcantara, Volker C. Radeloff

   Pages 91-117

7. The Effects of Institutional Changes on Landscapes in Ukraine

   • V. Lyalko, S. Ivanov, V. Starodubtsev, J. Palamarchuk

   Pages 119-147

8. Forest Changes and Carbon Budgets in the Black Sea Region

   • M. Ozdogan, P. Olofsson, C. E. Woodcock, A. Baccini

   Pages 149-171

9. Land Management and the Impact of the 2010 Extreme Drought Event on the Agricultural and Ecological Systems of European Russia

   • Tatiana Loboda, Olga Krankina, Igor Savin, Eldar Kurbanov, Joanne Hall

   Pages 173-192

10. Agricultural Fires in European Russia, Belarus, and Lithuania and Their Impact on Air Quality, 2002–2012

    • Jessica L. McCarty, Alexander Krylov, Alexander V. Prishchepov, David M. Banach, Alexandra Tyukavina, Peter Potapov et al.

    Pages 193-221

11. Land Change in European Russia: 1982–2011

    • Kirsten de Beurs, Grigory Ioffe, Tatyana Nefedova, Geoffrey Henebry

    Pages 223-241

12. Erratum to: Land Change in the Carpathian Region Before and After Major Institutional Changes

    • Catalina Munteanu, Volker Radeloff, Patrick Griffiths, Lubos Halada, Dominik Kaim, Jan Knorn et al.

    Pages E1-E2

13. Back Matter

    Pages 243-247

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This work analyzes the effects of one of the most dramatic changes of entire societies that the world has ever witnessed. It explores the collapse of socialist governance and management systems on land cover and land use in various parts of Eastern Europe. As readers will discover, this involved rapid and unprecedented changes such as widespread agricultural abandonment. Changes in the countries of the former Soviet block, former Soviet Union republics, and European Russia are compared and contrasted. 


Contributing authors cover topics such as the carbon cycle and the environment, effects of institutional changes on urban centers and agriculture, as well as changes in wildlife populations. The volume includes analysis of the drivers of agricultural land abandonment, forest changes in Black Sea region, an extreme drought event of 2010, impacts of fires on air quality and other land-cover/land-use issues in Eastern Europe. Satellite data used were mostly from optical sensors including night lights observations, with both coarse and medium spatial resolution. 


Ultimately, this work highlights the importance of understanding socioeconomic shocks: that is, those brief periods during which societies change rapidly resulting in significant impact on land use and the environment. Thus it shows that change is often abrupt rather than gradual and thereby much harder to predict.


This book is a truly international and interdisciplinary effort, written by a team of scientists from the USA, Europe, and Russia. It will be of interest to a broad range of scientists at all levels within natural and social sciences, including those studying recent and ongoing changes in Europe. In particular, it will appeal to geographers, environmental scientists, remote sensing specialists, social scientists and agricultural scientists.

• Breakup of USSR and land use change
• Land cover and land use changes
• Remote sensing and land use
• Socio-economic change and land use
• Agricultural land abandonment
• landscape/regional and urban planning
• remote sensing/photogrammetry

• NASA Headquarters, Washington, USA

  Garik Gutman

• Department of Forest and Wildlife Ecology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA

  Volker Radeloff

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