SFI Moorland Surveying App - Getting Ready for ELM

The SFI Moorland Surveying App is a service that is offered by the Foundation for Common Land (FCL) to enable those with an SFI Moorland agreement to be able to complete the actions required of the M0R1 action - FAQs on applying

This service is open to anyone that needs it and is available for use on both common and non-common land.

The app allows you to collect all the information required for the M0R1 action and forming a baseline to evaluate the public goods the land offers, helping identify opportunities for public goods. The service has been open nationally to everyone that needs it since July 2023, to date we are thrilled to over 130,000 ha of land currently signed up using the App. This app has been developed with heavy input from farmers and land managers with the goal of being as user friendly as possible, bringing in and retain more money within the farming community.

The app can be used both with and without phone signal and allows multiple users per project. This means there can be multiple users out surveying the area in the SFI agreement and they can also be at the same time (our current record is 12 surveyors on one project).

The charge for this service in 2024 will be 60 pence per ha (ex VAT) per year or a fixed fee of £90 (ex VAT) per year for projects below 150ha and will include provision of: 

  • The generation of SFI survey points (1 per 10 ha) divided into multiple areas for different surveyors (you choose your survey areas)

  • A project set up for data collection on the Mergin App 

  • Storage of your data in Mergin and provision of a Moorland survey data package to import into either; your Land App Project, or an alternative mapping package

  • Maps showing the key public goods on your moor; peat depth, surface roughness and SFI vegetation data

  • A detailed spreadsheet (a Moorland Recording Tool) with Summary Charts showing the existing public goods and opportunities for enhancing public goods

  • Support for integrating photos into your Land App Project 

  • Full online training resources, templates and troubleshooting support

For any further information or queries please contact our SFI Co-ordination Team:

sfi@foundationforcommonland.org.uk

07301 011446

You can also find out more information on the app you can watch our recent webinars on SFI Moorland on our Youtube page. You can find out more information on SFI Moorland please go to our SFI Moorland page.

The video below is a clip from our most recent webinar discussing the app with one of our users

FAQs on SFI Moorland

  1. I am already signed up to SFI22 Moorland Standard - do I still have to do my survey even though the RPA will terminate my agreement this year

    Yes, all SFI22 agreements are still live and so you will need to undertake your survey once in each year - the RPA will contact you about switching your SFI22 agreement to a SFI23 agreement

  2. I hear SFI23 is now available on commons?

    Yes, this is true. Following a successful beta trial with FCL, the RPA and three commons the controlled rollout of the SFI23 M0R1 action on common land has begun. All commons that submitted an expression of interest will be contacted in the order that they were submitted. If you have not done this then please email RPA at ruralpayments@defra.gov.uk with ‘SFI 2023 Commons/Shared Grazing Agreements’ in your subject line. Please see Applying for an SFI agreement on gov.uk.

  3. If the commons application system is now off-line can I still use the FCL Digital Survey App

    Yes, the FCL Digital Survey App is fully functional and can be used whether or not your agreement was set up off-line or online. Your Survey data is stored totally separately from your agreement. The FCL Digital App is a service run by FCL that is completely separate to the RPA.

  4. I have been told by the RPA that my common is not eligible due to BPS issues. What do I do?

    If you have been told by the RPA that your common is not eligible for M0R1 due to BPS issues then it is likely a mistake. Due to a computing miskake an email was sent out in October informing a large amount of commons that they could not apply to SFI. This was sent out by mistake and all those who were sent it should have been contacted to say this. If you are still being told this by the RPA it is likely because the agent who you are dealing with has not passed your question or case to the RPA commons team. In this case please send an email to sfi@foundationforcommonland.org.uk stating your SBI and customer name so we can bring this up to the commons team. We have dealt with this situation on three occassions and in all of them the customer was contacted within a day or two by the RPA to clarify that they were in fact eligible.

  5. I have non common land Moorland - how do I apply?

    Non common moorland can apply through the automated process as normal from the 18th September, please login to the Rural Payments service to begin your application.

History of the Surveying App

From 2022-2023 the Foundation for Common Land (FCL) led a unique Test and Trial (T&T), Road Testing the SFI22 Moorland Standard on three upland Commons.

Through this we developed the app that proved to be a valuable asset when data collecting for the SFI Moorland Survey. Engagement events that we held with over 110 attendees showed the need for the app and to date we have helped users survey over 40,000 ha of land.