Consolidating Agricultural Lands Drawing upon Experiences in East European Countries

Following a fifty-year period of production in collective farms, countries in Eastern Europe have made a significant progress in privatization of means of production ownership. However, scattered small lands, unexpectedly emerged from land reform itself, turned out to be a serious obstacle to sustainable development of agriculture sector in these countries. Most of the modern thoughts on land consolidation have generally been realized in large-scale by external and governmental institutions, though failed to succeed in sustainable achievements. As a result, a number of local groups have spontaneously been formed to control various dimensions of the scattered agricultural lands.The present paper has come out of exploring experimental and theoretical studies aiming at the illustration of discussions related to the land consolidation which is presented within an integrated approach based on a comprehensive understanding of rural operators, real life contexts and produced experiences. The paper reviews systematically the concept, importance and dimensions of land consolidation as a crucial need for a sustainable agricultural development. It also studies various natures of the scattered lands and the implications for the rural operators according to the existing evidence. It continues then with the explanation of such issues as basic principles, general requirements, implementation trend of the concerned projects, and challenges as well as practices known by the experiences of certain East European countries; and finally, some recommendations are made to perform a successful land consolidation in Iran with respect to the existing conditions of the country.