Land Consolidation and Its Effects on Afforested Agricultural Land: A Case Study of Ukraine

Abstract

The study is dedicated to the optimization of the naturally afforested land plots. The purpose of this paper was to substantiate land consolidation in the environment of natural afforestation in Ukraine. The look-back analysis of afforestation in the timespan of 20 years was carried out, and the need for the sustainable land use and keeping the tree cover on the afforested land plots was substantiated. Land consolidation, aimed at the optimization of use of agricultural, forest, and naturally afforested land of a territorial community is suggested. The availability of reserve land and the possibility of its involvement in the process of reallotment was substantiated. The development of multifunctional land consolidation was suggested; the reallotment was carried out based on the principles of rural land consolidation and forestry land consolidation. Two land consolidation options were suggested: land plot buying out and swapping the boundaries of the initial land plots as much as possible and land plot reallotment. The algorithms and practical implementation of these approaches in the Kipti territorial community of the Chernihiv Region of Ukraine were presented. As the result of land consolidation, the consolidated land plots, bordering on forest land, were created; the configuration and placement of agricultural land plots were improved. The prospects, limitations, and solutions to the issue of natural afforestation by means of land consolidation by the presented method were singled out.

1. Introduction

The experience of many countries at the national and local level witnesses that land consolidation is a practical mechanism, which can help resolve the issues of agricultural and forest land [1,2]. Forestry land consolidation is often addressed in combination with rural land consolidation [3]. For example, the issue of sustainable use of forest and pastureland is examined [4].

According to modern approaches, land consolidation is aimed at the development of spatial basis for the effective, i.e., sustainable land use [5]. The increased value of agricultural land plot is an important effect of consolidation [6], as well as the increased productivity of agriculture, and rural development [7]; however, nature conservation has become a trend lately [5].

The adaptation of existing land consolidation approaches to natural afforestation is prospective. It is important to utilize the potential of the afforested land, especially in the context of land consolidation aiming at the improvement of natural environment [8], for the afforestation of agricultural land plays an important role for the climate change [9].

Natural afforestation is considered to be a disadvantage for agricultural land use. Natural afforestation prevents agricultural land from its designated use, causes the alteration of outlines of land plots, and leads to the increased costs of cultivation [10]. A pattern usual for forested lowlands and forest-steppe zone of Ukraine is examined in the study. The lack of cultivation on land masses bordering on a forest or wood line for a protracted period leads to the appearance of forest cover on some of agricultural land plots. Bringing them to its initial condition is a challenging task and demands the specialized machinery and significant costs.

Agricultural land is usually naturally afforested, when it is abandoned and not cultivated [11]. Abandoned agricultural land is widespread in Europe [12]. The influence of abandonment differs by region and is usually evaluated as negative in Europe [13]. The abandoned land can facilitate the rehabilitation of environment, thus compensating the lack of forested areas, which can be considered as a positive factor [12].

Thus, transferring the afforested land plots into forest areas is prospective. This option is predefined by the Ukrainian legislation [14]. In the course of forestry land improvement, it is practical to consider the principles of forestry land consolidation. Forestry land consolidation is considered in the context of increasing the average size of private forest holdings [15], the development of joint forest landownership [16], or land tenure optimization in case forestry landownership is distributed among the state, municipalities and private owners [17].

The presented solutions may be considered as opposite to the issue of converting forests to cropland [18]. It is worth mentioning, that the main reason for forest area reduction, observed in the last 30 years, is agricultural expansion, and forest area is increased due to natural afforestation of agricultural land (e.g., on abandoned agricultural land) and artificial afforestation [19].

The existing approaches to forestry land consolidation, rural land consolidation, and multipurpose land consolidation do not resolve the issue of spatial optimization of agricultural land and forest land at natural afforestation.

The working hypothesis is as follows: land consolidation with the implementation of reserve areas allows for the improvement of agricultural land and forest land by natural afforestation. The purpose of this paper is to substantiate the agricultural and forest land consolidation at natural afforestation with the example of Ukraine. It is suggested to realize the predefined by the Ukrainian legislation preconditions on the enlargement of forest cover through transferring the afforested land to forest fund with the help of land consolidation. Land reallotment allows for the issue of transferring the afforested private land plots and parts of land plots to the forest fund to be resolved, and for the development of compact agricultural and forest land plots.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. Natural Afforestation

The natural afforestation of agricultural land is extensive in Ukraine. It is due to the process of the development of private agricultural landownership after the agricultural enterprises’ restructuring.

As a result of the alteration of land policies in Ukraine in the 2000s, virtually all the collective agricultural enterprises were restructured into market-type agricultural entities, which had no collective ownership rights on the agricultural land. Thus, collective agricultural enterprises as the entities, which had collective ownership rights on the land, were liquidated, and their successors did not acquire the ownership rights of that land. After the full-scale reorganization of collective agricultural enterprises in 2000, about 30 million hectares of agricultural land, which belonged to them based on collective ownership rights, were lost, clearly defined by the legislation owner. This land does not belong to the state because earlier the government transferred it to the collective ownership of the collective agricultural enterprises. It does not belong to the collective agricultural enterprises because they were liquidated due to reorganization.

As a result, over the course of the transfer of ownership rights, most of agricultural land was not cultivated, and the land bordering the forest was naturally afforested.

Common pine (Pinus silvestris) is predominant in Ukraine (Figure 1). Considering its distribution and natural properties, it is the predominant species of natural regrowth. Common pine grows up to 40 cm in height and up to 30 mm in diameter per year. The tree is about four meters high by the age of 10 years. Most of the naturally afforested land plots are covered with common pine 20–30 years of age.

Thus, non-cultivated agricultural land masses were subject to natural afforestation, and due to common pine being a fast-growing species, significant areas became inappropriate for agriculture. Such land plots are mostly cleared in order to return them to their original shape (Figure 2).

According to sustainable development goals [22], the issue of natural afforestation in Ukraine should be resolved considering the insufficient forest cover of Ukraine, redundance of arable land, and the priority of providing land to citizens for growing crops (Figure 3).

On one hand, the arable land to the total area ratio in Ukraine is one of the largest in the world [23], which should be considered in the management of naturally afforested lands. Up to 2022, a provision of preferably providing land for agricultural use was predefined by the legislation of Ukraine [24].

At the same time, the need for increasing the forest cover areas was acknowledged on the national level in Ukraine [14]. One of the main ways is the transfer of naturally afforested agricultural land to a forest fund.

According to official sources, the forest cover area of Ukraine is about 16%, and the stand of timber is estimated at about 2.1 bln. m³ [20]. In the latest decades, Ukraine faced the issue of chaotic logging, which caused the deterioration and alteration of the agricultural landscape and many other problems due to the dramatic reduction in forest cover like erosion, dust storms, mudslides, floods in a number of regions, etc.

The peculiarity of forest management in Ukraine is that half of forests are homogeneous forests and in need of additional maintenance. Most forests are environmentally important: up to 50% are of limited forest use, and the share of protected forests is high (16.1%). Significant areas of forests are in the zone of radioactive contamination [20].

At the current stage, the forests of Ukraine are mostly government property, and a significant share is communal property and those provided for permanent use to various government bodies for forestry activities (Figure 4).

The development of private forest land from private naturally afforested land plots can increase the forest land fragmentation and cause more issues for land management. At the same time, there are preconditions for keeping the natural forest cover and transferring the naturally afforested land plots to a forest fund considering the regional features.

2.2. Land Reserves

It was exemplified that land consolidation is most effective provided there are land reserves, which can be involved in the process of land reallotment [26]. There is a significant potential for involving additional land into consolidation projects in Ukraine. It was predefined by the process of land relations reforming and the establishment of private property, which began 30 years ago. A number of challenging issues arouse due to the multipart, prolonged, and costly for landowners process of land plot registration.

Redistribution or subdivision of collective agricultural land among a clearly defined scope of persons, usually members of an agricultural enterprise, with subsequent transferring to private property, was one of the constituents of land relations reforming. The subdivision was carried out in a number of stages: First, the area of a land share was determined in nominal units—relative cadastral hectares. The land plot was not demarcated afield, i.e., the place and boundaries of the land plot were not set at this stage. The right on the land share was vouched with a certificate. Such a land share, determined in relative cadastral hectares only, is not considered to be an item of immovable property according to the legislation of Ukraine, and the ownership right on the land share may not be registered. Not all the persons, who had the land share certificates, proceeded to the following stages to register their ownership right. Thus, the so called non-recalled land shares were developed, i.e., land plots, and the ownership right on which was not registered according to legislation at a certain stage of privatization. However, the land plot as an area of surface exists physically, since it was determined at the initial stage of redistribution.

As of 2018, the final year the non-recalled land shares could be registered, their total area was estimated at 400 thousand ha [27] (Figure 5).

Another challenging issue is the “non-distributed land shares”. Agricultural land only was subject to subdivision, whereas there was also non-agricultural land like field roads, field stations, wood lines, etc., on the territories of state and collective agricultural enterprises. The total area of this land is estimated at about 1.5 mln ha (15 bln m²) [28]. As a matter of fact, some of this land was transferred to communal property, for some—the owner was not identified, and it stayed in the collective ownership. This form of ownership is absent in the legislation of Ukraine in effect.

About 10 to 15 percent of land within the agricultural land masses are land plots, which can be defined as “escheated inheritance” (Figure 6). These are the land plots, the owners of which are deceased, and there are no heirs according to testament or law, or heirs either have no inheritance right or refused to accept the heirloom. Such land plots are defined as “escheated inheritance” by the decision of a court [29].

According to the legislation of Ukraine [30], after 1 January 2028, the non-recalled and not-redistributed land plots, as well as land of collective ownership, will be transferred to the communal property of the territorial community they are situated on. It is land that can be considered as reserve land and involved in the process of land consolidation on par with communal and state land. The non-redistributed and not-registered land plots, which in fact belong to collective ownership, will be further referred to as the non-recalled land shares.

Such land plots can be either afforested or not-afforested. Keeping the natural afforestation is suggested. This goal can be gained in the course of land consolidation, by land plot reallotment.

2.3. Study Area

The study is carried out on the territory with the total area of 11,238,280 m² in the Kipti territorial community, Chernihiv Region, Ukraine (Figure 7). The Chernihiv Region is a region in the northeast of Ukraine. It has a significant agricultural potential and is one of the most developed agricultural regions of Ukraine. Most of its territory is agricultural land. The area of forest fund is 20.7% of the total area of the region [31]. The wood species are distributed as follows: common pine—57.8%; oak—15.3%; birch—11.6%; and other wood and shrub species—15.3% [31]. The area of naturally afforested land plots is 5000 m² to 500,000 m² in the Chernihiv Region of Ukraine and are covered predominantly with common pine [32]. At the same time, uncontrolled logging is widespread. Forest restoration is mostly due to planting trees after indiscriminate logging and afforestation of areas unsuitable for agriculture like ravines, sands, etc. [31].

The project territory consists of 526 private agricultural land plots with the mean area of 12,687 m². There are non-recalled land shares and escheated inheritances with the total area of 188,550 m² within the territory. The project territory has the total area of 10,045,558 m² of agricultural land and 993,997 m² of forest land of state ownership. The areas of private, state, and communal land plots are determined according to the State Land Cadastre of Ukraine and Real Property Rights Register. The project territory borders on forest land on the west and south and has two wood lines.

The natural afforestation of agricultural land is one of the main issues for land use on par with significant land fragmentation, strip farming, irrational configuration of land plots, etc. Land tenure optimization is especially important for the local community, since most of the population is self-employed [33], and the lack of job opportunities in the rural areas is observed.

In the latest 20 years, 4,605,671 m² of agricultural land were naturally afforested (Figure 8). The areas are determined by field measurement; the root mean square error of the GNSS determination of the position of turning points is no more than 0.024 m. It is due to that that the project territory has been an object of a set of studies on its spatial improvement for about 30 years. According to the legislation of Ukraine, a land plot is identified as a naturally afforested land plot, when respective data are provided to the State Land Cadastre [24]. The accurateness of area determination corresponds to the demands of the data importing to the State Land Cadastre of Ukraine [34]. Data contained in the State Land Cadastre are a source for reference on land plot spatial characteristics. In most cases, using the satellite imagery [35] and UAV technology [36] are practical for determining the area of natural afforestation.

The natural afforestation was developed gradually, and it is corroborated by the satellite imagery history analysis (Figure 9, Figure 10 and Figure 11). Since the main species of natural afforestation is the common pine, at the current stage, the land is covered with young forest and cannot be used for agriculture.

Within the project territory, the afforested agricultural land plots are private, state, and communal; there are also afforested non-recalled land shares with undefined legal statuses (Figure 12).

Transferring the naturally afforested agricultural land plots to a forest fund matches the initiatives of territorial communities of the Chernihiv Region, which define it as their goal [32]. Forest restoration with the help of resolving the issue of naturally afforested agricultural land in the Chernihiv Region is supported by the State Forest Resources Agency of Ukraine; the CEOs of the Chernihiv Regional State Administration; the Chief Forest Officer of the Chernihiv North Interregional Forestry and Hunt Office, Land Management, Use and Conservation Office of State Geology, and Cadastre Head Office in the Chernihiv Region; and the heads of amalgamated territorial communities [32]. The development of a land consolidation method has the potential of becoming an effective land tenure optimization mechanism for naturally afforested land of various ownership forms.

Thus, the implementation of land consolidation has economic, social, and ecological reasons. Agricultural land tenure optimization allows for the effectiveness of agricultural activities, i.e., a decrease in the costs of cultivation to increase, and for the forest cover to remain as a constituent of the ecosystem.

3. Results

3.1. Land Consolidation Aiming at the Issue of Natural Agricultural Land Afforestation

The main goal of land consolidation is the spatial optimization of agricultural and forest land at the same time. Naturally afforested land plots are actually agricultural land plots not involved in agricultural activities. The aim of the project was to keep the young forest on the afforested agricultural land and the optimization of the area, configuration, and placement of land plots, as well as the road network.

The consolidation of naturally afforested land may be considered as a multifunctional land consolidation according to the general approach [5], especially for the afforestation of environmentally protected areas [37]. Land reallotment is aimed at spatial optimization based on rural land consolidation and forestry land consolidation.

The least possible alteration of the project territory is predefined by the method: the existing boundaries of land plots are kept as much as possible, and the non-recalled land shares are involved. Two algorithms are suggested for land consolidation on the project territory:

• By buying out and swapping the land plots with keeping the initial land plot boundaries as much as possible (algorithm 1);
• Land consolidation by land plot reallotment with the alteration of boundaries of the initial land plots (algorithm 2).

It is necessary to provide the choice to landowners to substantiate reallotment effectiveness. Such an approach is appropriate for Ukraine, since the alteration of land plot boundaries is a sensitive issue for landowners, and there are examples of successful agricultural land tenure optimization by land plot swapping [38]. Studies uphold that land plot exchange and buying out without alteration of the initial land plot boundaries and parts of land plots brings good results. It should be considered that land reallotment is not regulated by the legislation in effect, and agricultural land plots are cultivated by land tenants as a joint land mass.

The key precondition for reallotment is that the total area of bought-out private land plots, involved state and communal land plots, non-recalled land shares, and escheated inheritance should be equal or larger than the area of private afforested land plots:

$$S_{afP}\le S_P+S_C+S_S+S_N,$$

(1)

where S_afP is the total area of the private afforested land plots; S_P is the total area of bought-out not-afforested private land plots; S_С is the total area of the involved not-afforested communal land plots; S_S is the total area of the involved not-afforested state land plots; and S_N is the total area of the involved not-afforested non-recalled land shares and/or escheated inheritance land plots.

Let us suggest that there is a multitude М of the land plot involvement options, which are characterized by the involved area S. Then, according to Formula (1), the option multitude N₁, by which the reallotment can be performed by algorithm 1, is as follows:

$$N_1=\left\{\left.S\right|S\in M\right\},$$

(2)

$$\underset{S\in N_1}{\sup S}=S_0,$$

(3)

$$\underset{S\in N_1}{\inf S}=2S_{afP}{S}_{afC}+S_{afS}+S_{afN},$$

(4)

where S_afP is the total area of the afforested private land plots; S_afС is the total area of the afforested communal land plots; S_afS is the total area of the afforested state land plots; S_afN is the total area of the afforested non-recalled land shares and/or escheated inheritance land plots; and S₀ is the area of the project territory.

Option multitude N₂, by which the reallotment can be performed by algorithm 2, is as follows:

$$N_2=\left\{\left.S\right|S\in M\right\},$$

(5)

$$\underset{S\in N_2}{\sup S}=S_0,$$

(6)

$$\underset{S\in N_2}{\inf S}=2S_{afP}{S}_{afC}+S_{afS}+S_{afN}+S_B,$$

(7)

where S_afP is the total area of the afforested private land plots; S_afС is the total area of the afforested communal land plots; S_afS is the total area of the afforested state land plots; S_afN is the total area of the afforested non-recalled land shares and/or escheated inheritance land plots; S_В is the total area of land plots bordering on the afforested land plots; and S₀ is the area of project territory.

In case of land consolidation by land plots buying out and swapping, the algorithm 1 is presented in Figure 13. The following measures are stipulated:

• Buying out the afforested private land plots at the landowners’ will;
• Buying out the afforested parts of private land plots at the landowners’ will;
• Buying out the not-afforested private land plots at the landowners’ will;
• Involvement of not-afforested state and communal agricultural land plots, non-recalled land shares, and escheated inheritance;
• Involvement of afforested state and communal agricultural land plots, non-recalled land shares, and escheated inheritance;
• Swapping the afforested private land plots for not-afforested land plots;
• Swapping the afforested parts of private land plots for not-afforested parts of land plots;
• Alteration of the designated use of the afforested land plots, bought out and swapped from private landowners;
• Alteration of the designated use of the afforested state and communal land plots;
• Registration of land plots in the State Cadastre.

Thus, private land plots and parts of land plots are bought out and swapped. Purchase and sale and swapping agreements are executed according to legislation in effect. Land plot buying out and swapping is voluntary. Land plots are registered in the State Cadastre after the project approval and efficiency assessment.

There is an option of land plot reallotment without keeping the initial land plot boundaries; a general land plot reallotment method is implemented [39].

In case of reallotment without keeping the initial land plot boundaries, the algorithm 2 is presented in Figure 14. The following measures are stipulated:

• Buying out the afforested private land plots at the landowners’ will;
• Buying out the not-afforested private land plots at the landowners’ will;
• Involvement of not-afforested state and communal agricultural land, non-recalled land shares, and escheated inheritance;
• Reallotment by swapping the afforested private land plots for not-afforested land plots;
• Land redistribution: compact agricultural land plots and forest land plots are developed;
• Registration of land plots in the State Cadastre.

Private landowners participate voluntarily. Bought-out private, state, and communal land plots, as well as non-recalled land shares and escheated inheritance, are the basis of reallotment. Land plots are registered in the State Cadastre after project approval and efficiency assessment.

3.2. Practical Approbation of the Methodology

According to the legislation of Ukraine, a naturally afforested land plot is a land plot with an area of more than 5000 m², “partially or fully” covered with forest cover, which was developed in a natural way [24]. The features of wood species, which should cover a land plot to be considered a naturally afforested land plot, are not specified. According to the Land Code of Ukraine, it is the landowner of a private land plot or disponer of a state or communal land plot, who identifies a land plot to be a naturally afforested land plot [24]. At the same time, a land plot is considered to be afforested when it is covered with wood and shrub vegetation, with the top branches of trees evenly occupying at least 30 percent of the land plot (40 percent for young trees) [40]. Based on the abovementioned, two factors were considered to identify a land plot as a naturally afforested land plot. First, the lands, on which the top branches of trees evenly cover at least 40% of area, were considered. Second, identifying a land plot as a naturally afforested land plot, it is reasonable to consider the alteration of spatial characteristics of agricultural land masses due to afforestation. It is all about broken boundaries, interspersions, etc., and as a result, the decreased length of furrow, and idle turns of farm machinery, which lead to the impaired effectiveness of agriculture. It is worth mentioning that in Ukraine agricultural land masses divided into a big number of land plots are in most cases cultivated by holders as a unified land mass, which is corroborated by Figure 8, Figure 9, Figure 10 and Figure 11. Therefore, the edges of naturally afforested lands were developed to form compact polygons, the boundaries of which are not broken.

The results of the project implemented by two approaches are presented. Over the course of land consolidation by buying out and swapping (Figure 15), the designated use of afforested land plots was altered with the total area of 4,711,121 m²: 175 private land plots, 13 non-recalled land shares with the total area of 188,550 m², state land with the area of 1,474,193 m², and afforested communal agricultural land with the area of 2,528,406 m² were involved. Among them were 148 afforested and partly afforested private land plots, 4 non-recalled land shares, and 1,474,193 m² of state and 1,176,208 m² of communal land. A total of 118 private land plots were bought out, 109 of them afforested or partly afforested. A total of 44 private land plots were swapped, the exchange of parts of neighbouring land plots was carried out five times, and the afforested parts of land plots were bought out in 17 land plots. The designated use of 4 afforested non-recalled land shares was changed. The designated use of 1,474,193 m² of state and 1,176,208 m² of communal land was changed.

The development of rational land tenure with keeping the initial land plot boundaries is impossible without swapping and buying out the parts of land plots.

In the course of land consolidation by land reallotment (Reallotment plan ІІ) (Figure 16), 202 private land plots, 13 non-recalled land shares with the total area of 188,550 m², state land with the area of 1,474,193 m², and communal land with the area of 2,530,591 m² are involved into the reallotment. Among them are 148 afforested and partly afforested private land plots, 4 non-recalled land shares, and 1,474,193 m² of state and 1,176,208 m² of communal land. A total of 123 private land plots were bought out to include 112 afforested and partly afforested land plots. Over the course of reallotment, 42 private afforested land plots were swapped.

The designated use of 1,474,193 m² of state land and 1,178,393 m² of communal land was changed. In general, the designated use of afforested land plots with the total area of 5,781,879 m² was changed. The road network was optimized—as the result, the area of land occupied by field roads was decreased by 2185 m².

The project options are aimed at providing the landowners and users with a variety of land consolidation possibilities within the project territory and result in the removal of disadvantages of private land tenure within the project territory (

Table 1. Disadvantages of private land tenure before and after land consolidation.

Land Tenure Issue		Irrational Configuration	Full Natural Afforestation	Partial Natural Afforestation	Vague Legal Status
Before land consolidation	Quantity of land plots	22	148	42	13
	% from the total quantity of land plots	4.0	28.1	8.0	2.5
After land consolidation: Reallotment plan І	Quantity of land plots	12	0	6	0
	% from the total quantity of cases	2.3	0.0	1.1	0.0
After land consolidation: Reallotment plan ІІ	Quantity of land plots	3	0	0	0
	% from the total quantity of cases	0.6	0.0	0.0	0.0

).

As a result of land consolidation, 5,363,879 m² of afforested land plots were transferred to a state forest fund, and 418,000 m² of afforested land were transferred to a communal forest fund. Private agricultural land was increased by 322,990 m² (Figure 17).

The land reallotment option without keeping the boundaries of initial land plots has a substantial advantage in terms of the development of land masses of optimal configuration and road network optimization. However, land consolidation by buying out and swapping land plots also allows for most of the drawbacks of private land tenure to be removed. This approach can be used as transitional before the adoption of specialized laws.

4. Discussion

The research findings uphold the working hypothesis. As expected, the following goals are gained by means of land plot reallotment: the forest cover of naturally afforested land plots is kept—as the result, the forest area is increased; agricultural land plot configuration is improved; compact forest land plots are developed; road network is optimized: the stretch of roads is decreased, roads are redeveloped in accordance with the actual use. The presented approach is in line with the FAO recommendations on multipurpose land consolidation [26].

The methodology corresponds with the general demands on the formation of rational agricultural land tenure in Ukraine [41], keeping the natural forest cover on abandoned fields [42], goals of the sustainable complex development of forest, rural and nature conservation territories [43]. The positive influence of forest landscape restoration on rural households’ livelihood was considered in the study [44].

The formation of private forest land on the afforested land plots is another option for resolving the issue of naturally afforested land plots [14]. The mean area of such land plots in Ukraine is about 20,000 m². Such a decision can cause complicated management, loss of value of the fragmented forest land, little motivation of owners to cooperate in forest management [45], and other issues of the fragmented private forest land, which have been extensively examined [45,46]. In this case, it will be necessary to implement the forestry land consolidation in the future. This meth-od has advantages as compared to transferring the private naturally afforested land plots to forest fund, because it predefines the spatial optimization based on the principles of agricultural and forestry land consolidation.

The experience of Ukraine can be interesting from the perspective of involving reserve land, development of alternative approaches to consolidation, which stipulate the maxi-mum possible keeping the initial land plot boundaries, and the development of land consolidation methodology in the environment of essentially absent legislation on land consolidation.

The involvement of reserve territories, i.e., non-recalled land shares, escheated inheritance, and not distributed land plots is an alternative to land bank. At the current stage, the crucial role of land bank in cases the land consolidation projects have a number of goals to include the development and rehabilitation of nature conservation objects and facilities, has been established [26]. In the presented study, an approach is developed, when in case of agricultural land withdrawal landowners get another land plots instead of money compensation [26].

The presented approach allows for the implementation of land consolidation when there is no land bank as “an alternative to acquisition of private land through expropriation” [26]. There are no specialized laws on land consolidation and land bank in Ukraine. The approaches to land consolidation and land management projects should be completed with the consolidation of naturally afforested land.

The study develops approaches to land reallotment over the course of land consolidation, the combination of heuristic method and the existing optimization methods [47] and decision support systems [3] is possible. In order to increase the effectiveness of land consolidation by the presented method, the forest cover change evaluation techniques used for the abandoned agricultural land may be implemented [48]. The analysis of archival maps can also be carried out [49]. There are prospects for the selection of land plots for exchange with the help of GIS [50]. The development of a specialized geoportal [51] for the cases there is a need for formation of private forest land plots from the naturally afforested land plots is prospective. It can allow the consolidation of separated afforested land plots and make the forestry competitively viable.

The method responds to the request of social justice in land consolidation [52]. The success of land consolidation projects depends on the commitment and readiness of landowners and communities to participate [53]. First of all, several land consolidation options, with various levels of modification of project territory and involvement of various number of participants, are offered to the landowners to choose from. On the other hand, since the time the land plots were transferred to private property, the generations of owners have changed, and often the land plots belong to the grandchildren of the individuals who received the land plots in their private ownership. The heirs, who have inherited the naturally afforested land plots, face the challenges of increasing prices and military conflict. The possibility of swapping the afforested or partly afforested land plots for peer, not-afforested land plots is included into the project. Thus, the demands of food security and goals of sustainable development are considered during land consolidation, aiming at resolving the issue of agricultural land natural afforestation [22].

The presented approach can be implemented for abandoned agricultural land. The issue of not-used agricultural land is expanding due to the hostilities of war in Ukraine [54]. The presented method can be implemented in other regions.

The presented approach is most effective, when there is a substantial quantity of land plots, i.e., reserve land, state and communal land, non-afforested land plots for sale, or land bank, which can be used for reallotment.

5. Conclusions

Land consolidation is an effective method for resolving the issue of agricultural land natural afforestation. The development of approaches to forestry land consolidation and rural land consolidation is presented. The method allows for the issue of afforested or partly afforested private land plot optimization by means of land consolidation to be resolved. With natural afforestation, land consolidation is carried out by the pattern of multipurpose land consolidation, considering the spatial characteristics of agricultural and forest land.

The research corroborated the fact the natural afforestation is a challenging issue for agricultural activities, and there are preconditions for keeping the forest cover on the naturally afforested land plots. The following issues should be considered over the course of private naturally afforested land plot improvement:

• The protracted period of natural afforestation;
• The prospects of keeping the natural forest cover for the purpose of increasing the forest cover area and nature conservation;
• Prevention of forest land fragmentation;
• Provision of agricultural land to local communities for agriculture to improve food security.

The presented land consolidation method is aimed at resolving a set of issues:

• The issue of naturally afforested agricultural land;
• Optimization of configuration, area, and placement of agricultural land;
• Optimization of configuration, area, and placement of forest land;
• Road network optimization.

It is suggested to involve reserve land, i.e., non-recalled land shares, non-distributed land, and escheated inheritance to the land consolidation process.

For territorial communities, voluntary land consolidation options are suggested to include consolidation with keeping the boundaries of initial land plots by swapping and buying out land plots or their parts. Such an approach allows for the implementation of land consolidation projects without adopting the specialized laws. However, the research findings corroborate, that land consolidation by land reallotment has advantages in terms of the formation of agricultural and forest land plots with optimal configuration, as well as optimization of placement and stretch of field roads. Approbation of the project in a territorial community in Chernihiv Region corroborates the effectiveness of the presented method.

The implementation of the methodology for agricultural land, naturally afforested with various wood species, and adaptation of the methodology for highland regions of Ukraine will be elaborated in the future research. In addition to that, a significant share of agricultural land in Ukraine has been exposed to war. The cultivation of agricultural land is impossible due to terrain mining, which also facilitates the natural afforestation. In such environment, defining its legal status, and temporal ban from cultivation with providing the landowners with alternative agricultural land plots for the period of rehabilitation is a challenging issue.