The cadastral survey in Taiwan was initiated during the governance of Cheng Cheng-kung as needed for taxation and land reclamation, which was carried out for every three years with a survey result of about 36,900 Chia (1Chia?1Ha) of field area. The more integrated land surveys in Taiwan were carried ot during Kuang-hsu Time of Ching Dynasty, during the occupation by Japan and after the recovery.
1. During Kuang-hsu Time
During the administration of Liu Ming-chuan, the imperial inspector in Taiwan, the General Bureau of Survey was established under the approval of Ching government to open up the land survey around Taiwan, which renovated the land system in chaos and clarified the taxation by incorporating the domicile with the cadastre in accordance with the land survey based on the census as the initial administration of cadastre in the Province. The maps originated from the survey then involved castles, counties, villages, general and individual maps and eight baskets of survey booklets (Fig.1) with a surveyed area of 361,447 Chia, 214,734 for paddy field and 146,713 for dry land. Most of the maps and booklets had been destroyed during the occupation by Japan.
2. During the Occupation by Japan
During the occupation by Japan, the Taiwan Cadastral Regulations and Land Survey Regulations was promulgated by Japanese Government to survey the landform, demarcate the land categories, clarify the land rights, and correct the land lease and clean up the land lease right, on which a temporary land survey bureau was established to carry out the land survey with the land survey technology and methods of Germany, Switzerland, and France between 1889 and 1904. The land survey results, covering 37,891 maps of village ( Fig. 2, Fig. 3 ) , 1,647,374 cadastral surveys with an area of 777,850 Chia, 313,693 for p a ddy field, 305,594 for dry land, 36,395 for const r uction land and 122,168 for others (including 9,316 Chia of mountain woods), had become the first integrated land survey results in Taiwan. Between 1910 and 1914 a survey of woods and wasteland was carried out on the public and unsurveyed land that caused inexplicit demarcation, in which 19,395 cadastral maps were finished (including 964 maps of public woods wasteland); the survey results covered an area of 973,736 Chia of 381,863 surveys. And to clean up thoroughly the woods wasteland for convenience of administration, the survey of it was carried on between 1914 and 1925, which finished 2,078 maps of woods waste land with the scale of 1:12,000; the area covered 717,994 Chia of which 94,738 Chia in 31,547 survey were registered, with 623,256 Chia unregistered.
3. After the Recovery of Taiwan
Early after the recovery of Taiwan, the cadastral maps were not resurveyed due to the limited manpower and materials resources of the government, thus the survey results during Japanese occupation were maintained, where there were 1,288,000 ha (36 percent of the total area of Taiwan) of land surveyed and registered.
Land survey were carried out for those unregistered land to meet the requirement of land development and economic construction after the recovery, in which 41,600 ha of public hill slopes and withdrawn state owned protected woodland were surveyed and registered between 1949 and 1963, and 246,336 ha of mountainous conserved land (for aboriginals) were surveyed and registered between 1959 and 1995, and 168,980 ha of state owned wasteland and withdrawn shelter woodland were surveyed and registered between 1964 and 1991, and 12,091 ha of seashore land were surveyed and registered between 1985 and 1989, and etc. The surveyed and registered land from the recovery to 1998 covered a total area of about 580,000 ha (sixteen percent of the whole region of Taiwan). From 1998, the digitalized cadastral maps have been made from woodland images in accordance with the Three-year Proposal for Cadastral Survey and Land Register of State Owned Protected woodland, Phase 1, which aimed to finish the survey and registry of 1 million ha of state owned protected woodland (28 percent of the whole region of Taiwan).
The cadastral maps created during the occupation by Japan have become wrinkled and broken with serious errors (Fig. 4) and inevitable inaccuracy due to then survey technology and instruments and also copy. With the fast development of society, politics and economy, and the frequent land demarcation, natural transformation of landform and under the influence of personal change of land boundary, the cadastral maps have become inconsistent with the real situation of land use. Whereas the original cadastral maps were broken, damaged, of smaller scale or of other reasons, which had a great effect on the properties, either public or personal, and the governmental administration. To establish the new results of cadastral survey, clarify cadastre, eliminate the economic conflicts, and safeguard the legal rights of the people, a corrective cadastral survey were carried out in 1975, with a cadastral resurvey tried between 1973 and 1975, at the same time, the Ministry of Interior revised the Land Law and Practice Regulations for Cadastral Survey in 1975 to append the regulations concerning cadastral map resurvey as the legal ground for cadastral resurvey. Thus, the plans have been made since 1976 for resurvey of cadastral maps in Taiwan.
（1）Corrective Survey of Cadastral Maps
The corrective survey of cadastral maps in Taiwan Province was originally based on the Notes of Corrective Survey of Cadastral Maps for General Team of Survey issued by Land Administrative Bureau, Dept. of Civil Administration, Taiwan Province on April 19, 1954, and on Registration Regulations for Results of Land Resurvey issued by Executive Yuan on Jan. 12, 1955. There had been 9,272 ha land in 250,231 surveys between 1956 and 1972 in the cities of Taichung, Chiayi and Tainan, and counties of Yilan, Yunlin, Tainan, Kaohsiung, Pintung and Penghu.
（2）Trial Resurvey of Cadastral Maps
On June 27, 1972, the government of Taiwan Province promulgated the Implementation Procedures for Trial Resurvey of Cadastral Maps in Taiwan Province, and assigned the General Team of Survey, Land Administrative Bureau to conduct between 1973 and 1975 the trial resurvey of cadastral maps in the areas of Yilan, Taoyuan, hsinchu, Miaoli, Nantou, Taichung, Changhua, Yunlin, Chiayi, Tainan, Kaohsiung, Pintung and Taitung of which the cadastral maps have been seriously broken. The resurvey covered an area of 12,684 ha in 241,043 surveys.
（3）Cadastral Resurvey in Taiwan
As the trial resurvey had ended in good results, the three works of triangle test (for three years), surveying and mapping of basic landform (for five years) and resurvey of cadastral maps (thirteen years in three phases) had been carried out to establish sufficient data of land survey since 1976 when the Land Survey Planning in Taiwan presented by Ministry of Interior in 1974 was approved by Executive Yuan. As the resurvey of cadastral maps is the heaviest work in the Land Survey Planning in Taiwan, the Ministry of Interior revised the Land Law and Practice Regulations for Cadastral Survey in 1975 to append the regulations concerning cadastral map resurvey as the legal ground for cadastral resurvey.
When the thirteen-year plan in three phases ended in 1988, the resurvey in the cities of Taipei and Kaohsiung had been fully completed, while the large area of Taiwan and relatively shortage of surveyors, with the municipal planning areas keep expanding, land subdivided, and inconsistence between cadastral maps and the real situations, have made it difficult to clean up and renovate the old cadastral maps. As the survey can not be done in the way of aerial survey, only part of the regions have been finished. To continue and finish the resurveying of cadastral map, the 1999 Cadastral Map Resurvey Plan in Taiwan Province and the Twenty Years Further Program in Five Phases for Resurvey of Cadastral Maps in Taiwan Province (between 1990 and 2009) were issued for implementation year by year. The resurvey of cadastral maps is rescaled to 1:1,200 to 1:500(Fig. 5) with improved survey technology, high quality of survey results and application of computerization, which has helped to clarified the cadastral maps, eliminated economic conflicts and improved effectively the cadastral administration in Taiwan Province.