I believe Portugal is about to do something similar, albeit for different reasons. In their case the rural population has been urbanising. Those that remain are

I believe Portugal is about to do something similar, albeit for different reasons. In their case the rural population has been urbanising. Those that remain are old and are inevitably dying. Combine this with unhelpful inheritance laws, and the result is a lot of abandoned land. This land becomes unmaintained and is a big fire risk (as per the forest fires last summer) I understand that Portugal is going to require the registration of ownership of all rural land, and any land that is not registered will be reclaimed by (presumably) the state.