Economic Crisis and its Impact on Land-use of Lowland Drained Landscape in Western Ukraine

Internal and external economic conditions have significant impact upon agrarian policy, activities and production. In Ukraine they are also associated with rural employment, land-use changes, and natural resources protection. The aim of this paper is to identify economic and environmental impact of economic crisis in agrarian sphere at regional level, focused on ameliorative land-use changes and discover potential of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in assessment of the phenomenon. The analysis was carried out during 1990-2011 in Volyn’ region in Western Ukraine, region which borders on EU (Poland) and Belarus. The methodology focuses on multidisciplinary approach in order to measure consequences of changes in agricultural production, ecological conditions of lowland drained landscapes before economic crisis and in current situation using SWOT analysis of the system. We also identified strengths and weaknesses of different land-use scenarios to achieve optimal use of opportunities. Mechanisms, actions and innovations for development were analyzed in the article.