This paper presents an attempt to differentiate the Slovak rural landscape with respect to the possibility of effective potato cultivation and to characterise soil parameters of current potato cultivation areas with the aim to increase the sustainability of the potato production. The selection was based on soil climatic, production and economic parameters. By using the GIS tools and existing databases on soil characteristics in Slovakia, maps of soil suitability categories for potato cultivation were generated. In Slovakia, it was found that 12.3% of farmland is very suitable for potato cultivation and that as much as 43.1% is not suitable. Later, the specified categories were characterised in detail and specified with respect to geographic, soil, climatic, production and economic parameters. Currently, most potato crops are cultivated on Cambisols (27%), Chernozems (20%) and Fluvisols (18%). Loamy soils (content of particles <0.01 mm is 30–45%), soils without gravel (gravel content in the depth 0.0–0.6 m is 0.6 m) and soil situated on plains (slope 0°–3°) are dominant in these regions. We suggest that potato cultivation should be concentrated on the most suitable areas, thereby increasing the economic profitability, improving the ecological stability of the country and supporting the sustainability of the agriculture.

The aim of the study was to investigate the properties of the metallurgical sludge—waste from nickel production—on the landfill of a former nickel plant in Sereď, Slovakia, in relation to the technosols soil group. The sludge is a loose material which is a toxic industrial technological anthropogenic sediment of an unnatural black colour which originated from the crushing, washing, and leaching of poor iron–nickel lateritic ore in ammoniac solution and other caustics substances. The terrain reconnaissance enabled us to identify the points for the location of the probes. Here we dug seven probes and took 17 samples. In the samples the pH levels, the content of heavy metal and iron TOC, IC, C, and N, and the C:N ratio were determined. This study provides substantial empirical data on the properties of the metallurgical sludge. The results of the analyses clearly demonstrate that the sludge is a strongly alkaline material and contains toxic amounts of heavy metals (Cr, Ni). It is an artefact whose properties are unfavourable to living organisms and their communities. On the basis of the results of the probes analysis we identified the nature of the technosols on the given locality.

The principal aim of the study is to identify the nature and causes of changes to the surface of a landfill body of waste from nickel production located in the industrial zone of the town of Sereď (Slovak Republic). This change is related to natural and anthropogenic geomorphological processes characteristic of the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere. The landfill is an accumulative anthropogenic form of relief, and its body is composed from an artefact-metallurgical sludge, which has specific properties. The landfill constitutes a strange shape of relief at the Danubian Plane, which attracts attention with its physiognomy and also with the black color of the material significantly. It formed during the 30-year-long existence of the nickel smelter plant (1963–1993) and remained in this location, until the present day, for another 28 years after the end of production. Since 1994, the landfill has been the property of a private company that mines sludge in order to obtain residual metals.

The complex of the former Nickel smelter is located in the Podunajská rovina (Danubian plane) on the border Sereď town and village Dolná Streda. The landfill presents a highly negative hazardous element for environment and quality of life. It is a very anthropogenic damaged area which is located in the agrarian landscape. Some parts of the areas of the agricultural soils were from the fund of the agricultural soils excluded. Degradation of the region is the result of the non-conceptual socialist industrialization of Slovakia. After 30 years was stopped the production of nickel and cobalt (1963-1993) for economic and ecological reasons. Waste from production of nickel and cobalt remained here and degrades the environment in nowadays. Today is the landfill of waste a private property and owner exports the waste to foreign countries.

A comparative analysis of the forest growth features of low-productive grey forest sandy soils of the Polissia, the Forest-Steppe and the Northern Steppe of Ukraine was performed. Although grey forest soils from different natural zones are distinguished in the genesis of their soil rocks, as well as typical and zonal belongings, at the same time they are united by an important general characteristic, light texture, determining the similarity of physical, physico-chemical and agrochemical indicators and, in general, forest site capacity. A package of markers to assess the forest site capacity of sandy soils (pine habitats) with such soil quality indicators as the content of physical clay, the coarseness of the humified layer of soil profile and K2O content was revealed.