Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Land Use Policy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/landusepol Land use and land cover changes in post-socialist countries: Some observations from Hungary and Poland Katarzyna Cegielska a , Tomasz Noszczyk a, ⁎ , Anita Kukulska a , Marta Szylar a , Józef Hernik a , Robert Dixon-Gough a , Sándor Jombach b , István Valánszki b , Krisztina Filepné Kovács b a Department of Land Management and Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Environmental Engineering and Land Surveying, University of Agriculture in Krakow, Balicka 253c Street, 30-149 Krakow, Poland b Department of Landscape Planning and Regional Development, Faculty of Landscape Architecture and Urbanism, Szent István University, H-1118 Budapest, Villányi út 29-43, Hungary ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Land change analysis Land use/land cover Corine Land Cover Statistical analysis Spatial data Synergistic comparison Trend analyses ABSTRACT This study has analysed changes in land use and land cover (LUCC) in two post-socialist countries – Hungary and Poland, based upon cadastral data, statistical data, and CORINE Land Cover data. This is a new approach aimed to perform a synergy analysis carried out in accordance with the ‘top-down’ principle, i.e. from the level of countries (in the case of land use) to the level of provinces/counties (land cover). This approach facilitates more reliable results. The authors analysed LUCC in northern Hungary (the Pest County) and southern Poland (the Małopolska Province) using GIS and statistical methods. The main aim of the research was to identify and assess the ongoing LUCC changes and compare them in the assumed field of research. The results indicate the existence of a trend in each time series. A downward trend was revealed for agricultural land in Hungary and Poland as well as for uncultivated land in Hungary. An upward trend was found in other variables (uncultivated land in Poland and forest land in both countries). Changes in land cover in the Pest County and the Małopolska Province (in 2000 and 2012) show a decrease in agricultural areas and an increase in artificial surfaces, forest and semi- natural areas with the change in Poland being more intensive than that in Hungary. 1. Introduction Land use and land cover changes (LUCC) have become an important issue in studies on global environmental changes in recent years (Fan et al., 2017). Land use and cover are considered primary factors af- fecting ecosystems (Foley et al., 2005; Verburg et al., 2009) and land- scape values (Sallay and Jombach, 2011). This has resulted in LUCC's increasing global academic attention. The research was focused on the methodology of comparisons using GIS methods (Bewket and Abebe, 2013), fuzzy sets, and landscape metrics (Szabó et al., 2016), but also on forging a new approach to combining ecological, geographical, and social anthropological data in the study of LUCC (Kumpula et al., 2011). Scientists presented a study that employs a high-resolution land use change model to downscale land use changes from macro-scale models to the landscape level (Verburg, 2006) to provide salient suggestions for future land-use change analysis (Deng and Li, 2016). Studies on LUCC are a key element in understanding the relations and interactions between anthropogenic factors and the natural environment (Gaitanis et al., 2015; Kanianska et al., 2014). Both of these factors affect the LUCC to a greater or lesser degree. The current change trends are dominated by general degradation of the environ- ment (Feranec et al., 2010; Koellner and Scholz, 2008) and substantial fragmentation of the landscape (Bogoliubova and Tymków, 2014). Numerous studies globally note the rapid pace of LUCC resulting from the population growth (Lambin et al., 2001), intensive land use (Lambin et al., 2003; Matson et al., 1997), and loss of natural areas (Falcucci et al., 2007; Lepers et al., 2005). It is particularly important to appreciate LUCC since the knowledge of its importance is indispensable for the investigation of wider trans- formations in the global environment (Fan et al., 2017), climate changes, food security, biodiversity, climate adaptation (Kazak, 2018), mitigation policies (Meiyappan et al., 2014), and also to promote en- vironmental sustainability (Gaitanis et al., 2015; Kazak et al., 2017). It should be noted that in many cases the changes are adverse ones such as the development of valuable natural areas or setting aside of high- quality agricultural land (Mackiewicz and Karalus-Wiatr, 2017). Hence, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2018.06.017 Received 25 April 2018; Received in revised form 14 June 2018; Accepted 14 June 2018 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: cegielska_katarzyna@wp.pl (K. Cegielska), tomasz.noszczyk@urk.edu.pl (T. Noszczyk), a.kukulska@urk.edu.pl (A. Kukulska), szylarmarta.kgpiak@gmail.com (M. Szylar), rmhernik@cyf-kr.edu.pl (J. Hernik), dixongough@tiscali.co.uk (R. Dixon-Gough), jombach.sandor@tajk.szie.hu (S. Jombach), valanszki.istvan@tajk.szie.hu (I. Valánszki), filepne.kovacs.krisztina@tajk.szie.hu (K. Filepné Kovács). Land Use Policy 78 (2018) 1–18 0264-8377/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T