Land use Maps

maps that reflect the land resources and types of land use in the national economy. Land use maps are subdivided into land resource, land in service, and agricultural land use maps. Maps of the first group show the distribution of land by user (for example, the land use map in the Atlas of USSR Agriculture, 1960). Maps of the second group show the distribution of land in service (for example, the land in service maps in the atlases of Irkutsk and Kustanai oblasts). Maps of the third group reflect the use of agricultural lands (for example, the 1:1,000, 000 land use map of Indonesia).

By subject matter, land use maps are divided into general, which include all kinds of lands in service, and specific, which depict such individual types of land as arable land, hay fields, and pastures.

Land use maps are published on large, medium, and small scales in more than 70 countries: for example, on scales of 1:25, 000, 1:63, 360, and 1:625, 000 in Great Britain; of 1:25, 000 in Poland; of 1:500, 000 in Czechoslovakia; of 1:50, 000, 1:200, -000, and 1:1,000, 000 in Canada; and of 1:50, 000, 1:250, 000, and 1:1,000, 000 in Japan.

To coordinate research on land registration, the 16th congress of the International Geographic Union appointed a commission in 1949 on land use; by 1951 the commission had worked out the key of the 1:1,000, 000 world land-use survey map. Since then land use maps have been compiled on the same scale in many countries. Under the direction of the United Nations, the Geographic Institute of Agostini (Italy) prepared a world land use atlas, the first part of which was issued in 1969. In the USSR, large-scale land use maps of kolkhozes, sovkhozes, administrative regions, and oblasts are being prepared, and some of them (with a small scale) are included in regional atlases (Leningrad and Riazan’ oblasts and other areas). Land use maps are compiled from topographic maps, land allocation plans, aerial photo surveys, statistical data, and results of field trips.

Land use maps are the basis for the registration and qualitative and economic evaluation (cadastres) of land resources. They show the relationship between lands in service and natural conditions, knowledge of which is essential for scientific planning of the rational use of land.