Farmers in the ANC scheme were spared huge losses after folks in Brussels were reminded it rains a lot in Ireland, according to Teagasc director Gerry Boyle. “When the original maps came out first, Ireland was going to be a substantial net loser,” Prof Boyle told the Oireachtas agriculture committee on Tuesday. Teagasc’s assessment was that “the officials in Europe that put this map together had forgotten that we were a very wet country”, he recalled. “We rebalanced things at the time.” Asked by committee chair Pat Deering about Teagasc’s involvement in the ANC redesignation appeals process, Prof Boyle said farmers could use his agency’s publicly available data on soil type and grass growth, but staff will not participate in the process directly.