Ending hunger, achieving food security and promoting sustainable development are at the top of the list of United Nations sustainable global development priorities after 2015. In addition to many positive effects, efforts of mankind regarding the reduction of rural poverty realized through the Green Revolution have had many negative effects, primarily related to natural resources. Irreversible devastation of land, air and water quality deterioration and jeopardizing biodiversity have been recognized as key elements of unsustainability of existing agricultural development concept.

North China is the most important food basket of China, where the majority of wheat and corn are produced. Most crops grown in North China are irrigated, thus water security is food security. Since the 1980s, drying has been frequently observed, as shown by a reduction in precipitation, cutoff in riverflow, and shrinkage of lakes. This increase in drying cannot be explained by climate change alone. We propose that intensive land-use in this area in recent decades has had a significant impact.

Land resources of Ukraine, having economic, social, natural, cultural and historical significance, mainly are located within rural areas. Despite the fact that Ukraine has a significant land and resource potential of the territories, intensification of the use of land resources, in particular in agriculture, leads to the depletion of soil cover, land degradation and landscape destruction. The environmental policy of Ukraine provides for introduction of the principles of sustainable development in all fields of environmental management.

Other papers concerning agricultural economics frequently emphasise a problem of low resource productivity. However, the measuring methods are controversial, because they do not consider a progressive depreciation of fixed assets in agriculture and the new utilities of land on the conditions of sustainable development. These preconditions entitle to formulate a hypothesis that a productivity of capital in agriculture in Poland is increasing because of intrinsic values of agricultural areas. This implies a need of rethinking the neoclassical land rent theories.

The grey forecast and the sustainable use evaluation are conducted on the data of farmland resources from 2010 to 2020 in Pingingshan City by using the area of farmland land from 1999 to 2010 and by applying the gray forecast and land pressure system. The results show that from 2010 to 2020 the quantity of farmland resources maintains balance; the minimum per capita farmland in Pingdinshan stays around the lower limit of per capita amount of farmland in China; the pressure of farmland is rather huge and the farmland protection is not so optimistic.

In order to objectively and reasonably evaluate the actual and potential value of cultivated land, both social and ecological values are introduced into the classification and grading index system of cultivated land based on the viewpoint of sustainable development, after considering the natural and economic values of cultivated land. Index system construction of the sustainable utilization of cultivated land should follow the principles of economic viability, social acceptability, and ecological protection.

The main tasks of land consolidation are to eliminate land fragmentation and to facilitate farms of optimal size. One of the most important preconditions of land consolidation is forming of optimal size farmland plots in property and use, and land fragmentation, which has a major impact on both the operating conditions and other rural development processes. Land fragmentation bothers not only land management, but also increases transport costs. During the land reform in the rural areas, land plots in ownership and rented land plots are developed per several land units.

The present distribution of forests and the degree of their transformation by man are the results of natural factors and cultural development. The limit between forested areas and open spaces, as well as differences between intensively used forests and those showing small or no traces of human intervention, is determined by social needs and values, economic opportunities and political regulations. Forests are currently perceived by the population as physical and social spaces profoundly influenced by timber use and forest management.

In article is considered the existing system of documents of socio-economic planning of administrative and territorial units of the Republic of Belarus. It is expedient to develop a package of documents of a sustainable development of primary administrative and territorial units (village councils) for improvement of this system. Within implementation of the project of the international technical assistance the analysis of potential opportunities of rural territories for sustainable development goals is carried out.

The article considers the role and importance of the borderline position of the Belarusian-Lithuanian region, which influences the transformation processes of territorial structures. Particular attention is paid to the areas of coordinated activities on the formation and functioning of transboundary protected natural areas, as well as spatial planning activities for the sustainable use of their constituent natural complexes. The resulted results of researches are received within the limits of realization in 2014-2015.