Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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The AgriSnap™ application is the DAFM’s geotag photo app designed as an IT solution to ease the administrative burden on farmers. AgriSnap™ was originally developed as part of the Horizon 2020 New IACS Vision in Action (NIVA) project. My department led the development of the app in collaboration with The Walton Institute (South East Technical University), who provided the expertise in app design. Since November 2022 AgriSnap™ has been solely owned and maintained by my department.

In 2023 further developments were made to the app by the DAFM to allow agents to record ACRES scorecard information within the app. This work was led by the AgriSnap team within my Department in conjunction with the ACRES team. The layout and information captured within each scorecard was designed and agreed by a group containing representatives from the ACRES team, the ACRES Co-operation Project (CP) teams and the AgriSnap team. Farmers and farm advisors were not involved in the initial development of the ACRES scorecard element of AgriSnap™. Input was also received from the National Parks and Wildlife Service and the Department of Housing.

The ACRES CP teams were selected based on an e-tender process and as such this work is one of multiple tasks for which they received remuneration. As farmers and farm advisors were not involved in the ACRES scorecard AgriSnap™ development no remuneration was due. Based on feedback from farm advisors further developments are being made to the scorecard workflow for 2024 to improve the user experience.