The establishment of a sustainable land use system is crucial in Hungary (SE Europe) where 30% of croplands lie on former floodplains, and 40–45% of arable lands are drought-prone. We calculated and compared the monetary value of the main wetland ecosystem services, the profitability of land use and the additional costs of grain producer system on land at risk from groundwater inundation on the Hungarian Plain. We show that orchards and forestry generate a much higher profitability in former wetlands than cropland farming. Using the replacement cost method, we prove that the reservoir capacity of restored wetlands with an ecologically optimal 0.5 m water depth could replace 2150 €ha⁻¹ flood protection investment cost. The calculated costs of protecting land under the two highest groundwater risk categories between 1999–2005 was 37.2 €ha⁻¹ y⁻¹ and 14.9 €ha⁻¹ y⁻¹, respectively. Although the flood protection benefits of former wetlands may provide an appropriate value base for restoration per se, combined with the potential advantages of land use change from cropland to forest in former wetlands and the carbon sequestration benefit provide ‘win-win’ solutions for land users and institutional actors interested in flood prevention, environmental protection and climate mitigation.

在匈牙利（东南欧），建立可持续的土地利用系统至关重要。匈牙利的农田中有30％位于以前的洪泛区，而耕地中有40-45％的土地易干旱。我们计算并比较了主要湿地生态系统服务的货币价值，土地利用的获利能力以及谷物生产系统在匈牙利平原上因地下水淹没而处于危险中的土地上的额外成本。我们表明，果园和林业在以前的湿地中比农田耕种产生更高的利润。使用重置成本法，我们证明了生态学上最佳 水深为0.5 m的恢复湿地的水库容量可以替代2150  €ha ^-1防洪投资成本。在1999-2005年之间，在两个最高的地下水风险类别下，保护土地的计算成本分别为37.2  €ha ^-1  y ^-1和14.9  €ha ^-1  y ^-1。尽管前湿地的防洪效益可能会为其本身提供适当的价值基础，再加上前湿地从耕地到森林的土地利用变化的潜在优势以及碳封存收益为土地使用者提供了“双赢”的解决方案和对防洪，环境保护和减缓气候变化有兴趣的机构参与者。