TRANSFER INTO USE OF UNUSED AGRICULTURAL LANDS: SIGNIFICANCE, CHALLENGES, SOLUTIONS

Abstract

The article considers the urgent challenge of modern land relations – transfer into use of unused agricultural lands, area of which makes over 50 million ha, including 31.8 billion ha of agricultural lands, 19.4 million ha of arable lands as estimated by now according to the data of the Ministry of Agriculture of Russia. The research of the problem as for non-use of lands revealed three groups of reasons: economical, natural (ecological), and social. The economic reasons include generally unsatisfactory financial and economical conditions of the agricultural producers, natural reasons imply low productivity of lands due to unfavorable water regime, negative influences, natural and anthropogenic degradation processes; social reasons cover migration of population from villages, improper land use, including allocated land shares, absence of accurately defined boundaries, location of lands of this category. In order to solve the problem of transfer of unused agricultural lands into active economic turnover the need appears not only for more then 660 million roubles, but first of all, for the comprehensive land use planning measures on planning, rational use and conservation of the transferred lands. For this purpose the land use planning schemes should be drawn up for the areas of the Russian Federation subjects and their municipal units, as well as the projects of the intraeconomic land management and working projects.