Agricultural Land Abandonment as a Global Land-Use Change Phenomenon

Introduction to farmland abandonment

The reasoning behind farmland abandonment

Urban and peri-urban farmland abandonment

Surveys, revealing behavioral aspects of farmland abandonment

Measuring farmland abandonment​

Land-use policies and reuse of abandoned farmlands

Implications of abandonment to GHG offsets and biodiversity

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Introduction to farmland abandonment in the context of global land transitions. Global land cover change, the discourse on definitions of farmland abandonment. Historical and modern aspects of farmland abandonment.

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Prishchepov, Alexander V. “Agricultural Land Abandonment.” In Environmental Science, by Alexander V. Prishchepov. Oxford University Press, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1093/obo/9780199363445-0129. Download.

• Encyclopedia-like article on agricultural land abandonment with suggested readings.

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Grădinaru, Simona R., Cristian I. Iojă, Gabriel Ovidiu Vânău, and Diana Andreea Onose. “Multi-Dimensionality of Land Transformations: From Definition to Perspectives on Land Abandonment.” Carpathian Journal of Earth and Environmental Sciences 15, no. 1 (February 2020): 167–77. https://doi.org/10.26471/cjees/2020/015/119

 

• A paper explicitly examines the complexity of the definition of farmland abandonment from semantic, legislative, botanical, and remote-sensing perspectives.

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Holl et al.,2022. “Redefining “abandoned” agricultural land in the context of reforestation.” Frontiers in Forests and Global Change 6. https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2022.933887.

• A new conceptualization of abandoned agricultural land that incorporates changes in landholding status over time into determining whether land is abandoned or not.

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The reasoning behind farmland abandonment. The concept of underlying and proximate causes. The role of telecoupling. The progress on studying the drivers of farmland abandonment and outlining research gaps.

 

Meyfroidt, Patrick. “Approaches and Terminology for Causal Analysis in Land Systems Science.” Journal of Land Use Science, December 21, 2015, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/1747423X.2015.1117530 .

• Terminology used in land system science.

 

Geist, H. J., and E. F. Lambin. “Proximate Causes and Underlying Driving Forces of Tropical Deforestation.” Bioscience 52, no. 2 (2002): 143–50.

• A conceptual framework for understanding interlinkages between proximate and causal drivers of landscape change.

 

Subedi, Yuba Raj, Paul Kristiansen, and Oscar Cacho. “Drivers and Consequences of Agricultural Land Abandonment and Its Reutilisation Pathways: A Systematic Review.” Environmental Development, November 2021, 100681. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envdev.2021.100681 .

• A systematic review of the drivers of farmland abandonment, including both positive and negative implications of farmland abandonment. Attention is paid to revisiting the reuse of abandoned farmlands.

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Schierhorn, Florian, Thomas Kastner, Tobias Kuemmerle, Patrick Meyfroidt, Irina Kurganova, Alexander V Prishchepov, Karl-Heinz Erb, Richard A Houghton, and Daniel Müller. “Large Greenhouse Gas Savings Due to Changes in the Post-Soviet Food Systems.” Environmental Research Letters 14, no. 6 (June 20, 2019): 065009. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab1cf1 .

• How land-use change and changing diets shape production and carbon emissions via telecoupling.

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Urban and peri-urban farmland abandonment

Grădinaru, S. R., Iojă, C. I., Onose, D. A., Gavrilidis, A. A., Pătru-Stupariu, I., Kienast, F., & Hersperger, A. M. (2015). Land abandonment as a precursor of built-up development at the sprawling periphery of former socialist cities. Ecological Indicators, 57, 305-313

• Example of a study on periurban transformation, including farmland abandonment.

 

Hou, Dawei, Fanhao Meng, and Alexander V. Prishchepov. “How Is Urbanization Shaping Agricultural Land-Use? Unraveling the Nexus between Farmland Abandonment and Urbanization in China.” Landscape and Urban Planning 214 (October 2021): 104170. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2021.104170.

• Bringing ongoing urbanization in China.

 

Fayet, C. M., Reilly, K. H., Van Ham, C., & Verburg, P. H. (2022). What is the future of abandoned agricultural lands? A systematic review of alternative trajectories in Europe. Land use policy, 112, 105833.

• Perspectives for abandoned and cultivated lands following the debates, including rewilding and the Green Deal.

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Surveys, revealing behavioral aspects of farmland abandonment

​Grinfelde, Inga, and Mathijs, Erik. “Agricultural Land Abandonment in Latvia: An Econometric Analysis of Farmers’ Choice.” Agricultural Economics Society Annual Conference, Imperial College, South Kensington, London, January 1, 2004. https://doi.org/10.5281/ZENODO.6798669 .

• An example of a farm survey and establishment of the causal framework to evaluate the factors affecting farmland abandonment.

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Prishchepov, Alexander V., Elena V. Ponkina, Zhanli Sun, Miroslava Bavorova, and Olga A. Yekimovskaja. “Revealing the Intentions of Farmers to Recultivate Abandoned Farmland: A Case Study of the Buryat Republic in Russia.” Land Use Policy 107 (August 2021): 105513. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2021.105513 .

• An example of a survey of farmers and evaluation of behavioral mechanisms, plus the establishment of the causal framework.

 

Chen, Qianru. “Analyzing Farmers’ Cultivated-Land-Abandonment Behavior: Integrating the Theory of Planned Behavior and a Structural Equation Model.” Land 11, no. 10 (2022): 1777. https://doi.org/10.3390/land11101777.

• Testing the theory of planned behavior in the context of the underlying causes of farmland abandonment in China

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Measuring farmland abandonment

Prishchepov, Alexander V., Katharina Anders, Jan Feranec, et al. “The Progress and Potential Directions in the Remote Sensing of Farmland Abandonment.” Remote Sensing of Environment 331 (2025): 115019. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2025.115019.

• Systematic literature review with 131 studies in the remote sensing field, highlighted thematic (other than cropland abandonment) and geographic gaps (beyond Eurasia and China), as well as the emergence of multisensory monitoring and the importance of clearly documenting and making publicly available the mapped abandonment phenomenon. Most studies are local and regional, missing global products.

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Liu, Tao, Le Yu, Xiaoxuan Liu, et al. “A Global Review of Monitoring Cropland Abandonment Using Remote Sensing: Temporal–Spatial Patterns, Causes, Ecological Effects, and Future Prospects.” Journal of Remote Sensing 5 (2025): 0584. https://doi.org/10.34133/remotesensing.0584.

• A review of studies on cropland abandonment. A strong emphasis on commonly applied methods in satellite remote sensing. Importance of studying different examples of cropland abandonment (i.e., incomplete, full abandonment, conversion to other land uses).

 

Yin et al., 2020. Monitoring cropland abandonment with Landsat time series. Remote Sensing of Environment 246: 111873 DOI: 10.1016/j.rse.2020.111873

• This study is the first to map abandonment and recultivation across different environments and agricultural systems worldwide using long-term Landsat time series.

 

Goga et al., 2019. A Review of the Application of Remote Sensing Data for Abandoned Agricultural Land Identification with Focus on Central and Eastern Europe. Remote Sensing. 11: 2759. DOI: 10.3390/rs11232759

• A review of using remote sensing techniques to map abandonment in Eastern Europe.

 

Lesiv et al., 2018. Spatial distribution of arable and abandoned land across the former Soviet Union countries. Scientific Data 5: 180056.  DOI:10.1038/sdata.2018.56

• Large-scale abandonment mapping based on existing land cover products.​​

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Land-use policies and reuse of abandoned farmlands

Fayet, C. M., Reilly, K. H., Van Ham, C., & Verburg, P. H. (2022). What is the future of abandoned agricultural lands? A systematic review of alternative trajectories in Europe. Land use policy, 112, 105833.

-           Perspectives for abandoned and cultivated lands following the debates, including rewilding and the Green Deal.

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Meyfroidt, Patrick, F. Schierhorn, A. V. Prishchepov, D. Müller, and T. Kuemmerle. “Drivers, Constraints and Trade-Offs Associated with Recultivating Abandoned Cropland in Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan.” Global Environmental Change 37 (2016): 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2016.01.003 .

• “Limited” availability of abandoned lands to satisfy growing food demand.

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Implications of abandonment to GHG offsets and biodiversity

Zheng, Qiming, Tim Ha, Alexander V. Prishchepov, Yiwen Zeng, He Yin, and Lian Pin Koh. “The Neglected Role of Abandoned Cropland in Supporting Both Food Security and Climate Change Mitigation.” Nature Communications 14, no. 1 (2023): 6083. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-41837-y.

• Looking at trade-offs and synergies, win-win, and win-lose scenarios with the look at global cropland abandonment

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Bell et al., 2023. Quantifying the recarbonization of post-agricultural landscapes. Nature Communications. 14: 2139. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-37907-w

• Latest comments on the potential of abandoned lands for carbon storage through active recarbonization

 

Crawford et al., 2022. Rural land abandonment is too ephemeral to provide major benefits for biodiversity and climate” Science Advances. 8: eabm8999. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abm8999

• This study showed that abandonment is more fleeting than people thought. The frequent re-cultivation hampers the full potential of abandoned croplands for conservation and carbon sequestration

 

Næss, Jan Sandstad, Otavio Cavalett, and Francesco Cherubini. “The Land–Energy–Water Nexus of Global Bioenergy Potentials from Abandoned Cropland.” Nature Sustainability, ahead of print, January 18, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-020-00680-5.

•  Farmland abandonment and potential for bioenergy production

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Queiroz, Cibele, Ruth Beilin, Carl Folke, and Regina Lindborg. 2014 “Farmland Abandonment: Threat or Opportunity for Biodiversity Conservation? A Global Review.” 12: 288–96. https://doi.org/10.1890/120348.

• A global overview of farmland abandonment examines the biodiversity component of this process.