# Intensity and Driving Forces of Land Abandonment in Eastern Poland
## 4 Discussion
This process shows a high spatial variation, which suggests the role of local driving forces. External causes act as triggers of the process while internal causes impact the size of abandoned land and areas where land is abandoned. Among external factors, natural factors affect the productivity of soils and, consequently, the profitability and competitiveness of the product on offer [23]. Such a situation occurs in Lublin Province (Figure 12). The intensity of land abandonment is clearly less in Lublin Province, a major agricultural region, than in Poland's mountain regions. For example, [PERSON] et al. [44] demonstrated that while the mean intensity of this process in the Carpathians was 14% during the last few decades, the maximum intensity exceeded 30%. In small areas (districts), this index can even exceed 45% [45]. Spatial analyses conducted in Susiec District show that the area of land excluded from agricultural use, evaluated by means of detailed analyses of aerial photographs, is considerably underestimated in comparison to CORINE Land Cover (CLC) data. Since the smallest area distinguished for the CLC inventory is 25 ha, it can be used to identify only 247 ha, which represent only 27% of all land that was actually abandoned. This results from the presence of a large number of small plots subject to land abandonment. These plots are so small that they are not recorded in small-scale maps [29; 46]. [PERSON] and [PERSON] [37] mentioned the difficulty of determining the actual intensity of this process due to its dispersed character and a certain subtlety of changes. The use of LiDaR data is surely a method that will enable very detailed studies in this respect [47; 48]. The analysis of correlations between the statistical characteristics of the counties (Table 1) indicate that the following factors resulted in the spatial variation of the intensity of land abandonment in Lublin Province in the years 1990-2018: (i) natural conditions of agricultural production; (ii) intensity of the agricultural use of space; (iii) forest cover; (iv) number of small farm holdings; and (v) intensity of external migration. The process of land abandonment finally results in an increased forest cover and, to a smaller extent, the conversion of arable land into built up areas. The role of factors such as farm holding size, natural conditions (soils), and migration balance in the present-day land abandonment processes in Poland's metropolitan areas was highlighted in [49]. [PERSON] et al. [37] indicate natural conditions  
Figure 12: Agricultural land area versus the natural conditions for agriculture in Lublin Province. (slope angle) and employment opportunities outside agriculture as the key factors determining land abandonment in the Polish Carpathians. Since land abandonment results from the joint effect of several factors, it is not easy to find clear statistical correlations between the intensity of the process and the individual characteristics of the counties [50]. It should be added that in both cases, these characteristics show spatial differences, and providing one mean value for the whole entity is a far-reaching simplification. Nonetheless, the set of characteristics favourable or unfavourable to this process can be identified in the case of a few counties. It should be noted that such correlations did not occur for other counties, which may result from, for example, the considerable spatial diversity of the environment or socio-economic characteristics within those districts. (a) Hrubieszow County has the smallest intensity of land abandonment, very good natural conditions, large share of arable land, relatively large farm holdings, and a high negative migration balance;  
(b) Pulawy County has the highest intensity of land abandonment, quite good natural conditions, the smallest mean farm holding size, and many migrations from villages to towns;  
(c) Ryki County has a high intensity of land abandonment, relatively poor natural conditions, and a high level of migrations from villages to towns.