The international community affirms the critical role of forests in climate change mitigation, which includes reducing emissions from degradation and deforestation, carbon stock conservation, sustainable forest management, and increasing carbon stocks in developing countries. It relates to land use and land cover changes. This study aims to review land use and land cover changes (LULC) in two decades, namely 2000–2010 and 2010–2020, and the impact on carbon stocks. Landsat satellite imagery in 2000, 2010, and 2020 are classified into six categories: built-up area, cropland, forest, water body, bareland, and grassland. This classification uses supervised classification. The accuracy kappa coefficient values obtained for the LULC 2000, LULC 2010, and LULC 2020 maps were 89.61%, 83.90%, and 87.10%, respectively. The most dominant systematic LULC change processes were forest degradation in 2000–2020; the transition of forest to cropland (349.20 ha), forest to bareland (171.19 ha), and forest to built-up area (661.68 ha). Loss of using the forest for other uses was followed by a decrease in carbon stock. There was a high decrease in carbon stock in the forest category (11,000 Mg C∙y–1). The results showed a significant change in land use and cover. The decline in the area occurred in the forest category, which decreased from year to year. Meanwhile, the built-up area increases every year. Carbon stocks also decrease from year to year, especially forests as the most significant carbon store, decreasing in the area.

The aim of the study was to recognise the accumulation of organic carbon (SOC) in the soils of Polish grasslands (GL) and to consider the possibility of increasing its sequestration in these soils. The Tiurin method (mineral soils) and the mass loss method (soil of organic origin) were used. It was found that: (i) the average SOC content of mineral soils is 2.44% and of organic soils – 10.42%; (ii) according to the Polish criteria, approximately 84% of GL mineral soils are classified as classes with high and very high SOC content, and over 15% and 1% – in classes with medium and low SOC content, respectively; more than 99% of organic soils belong to two classes with the highest SOC content and less than 1% to the class with an average content; (iii) according to the European Soil Bureau, the share of GL mineral soils with a high SOC content is slightly over 4%, medium – slightly over 47%, and low and very low – around 50%; for organic soils they are 67, 29, and 4%, respectively; (iv) the reserves of organic carbon in the 0–30 cm layer on the entire surface of GL soils amount to 412.7 Tg of SOC. There is considerable scope for increasing the SOC stock in meadow-pasture soils.