The Department of Agriculture has committed to rectifying issues with maps on the Galway island of Inishbofin which have been causing problems for over 20 years.

One farmer on the island told the Irish Farmers Journal that issues with incorrect boundaries on maps are going back as far as area aid times.

“The problem with the maps is that the alignment is incorrect, there’s slippage.

“For example, my field, half of it is moved onto the neighbour’s field and the whole island is the same way.

“Back when we were doing area aid, we were asked to physically correct them by re- drawing the boundaries and we did that for a while but they returned the same way year-on-year,” he said.

Frustration

However, this is now causing huge frustration for planners trying to get scoring done for ACRES which works through the Department of Agriculture’s Agri Snap app.

“It’s difficult enough to get any planner onto the island and they’re just getting pure pissed off with the workload. They had to re-map all the parcels physically to get them correct,” the farmer said.

He added that every year, the Department has promised to correct the mapping issues, yet it has still not been rectified.

ACRES co-operation applications have been described as taking four to five times longer than normal, as advisers are forced to revert back to pen and paper.

Resolve

However, this week, the Department told the Irish Farmers Journal said it is developing a new Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS) that will replace the current 25-year-old system and resolve any “outstanding historical issues” with the placement of parcels for 2024.

“The new LPIS was first introduced in Louth in 2019 and since then has been rolled out across a further 23 counties.

“In 2024 the final two counties, Galway and Clare will be completed leaving a fully rebuilt LPIS. This will also include Inishbofin,” the Department said. The LPIS system underpins key farm payments such as the Basic Income Support for Sustainability (BISS).