Farming, growing or forestry businesses based in England can apply for a share of up to £850,000 for feasibility projects to improve productivity, sustainability resilience and move the agricultural sector to net zero.
Apply by 14 February, 2024.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) will invest up to £850,000 in innovation projects.
This funding is part of Defra’s Farming Innovation Programme which is a partnership with UKRI’s Transforming Food Production Challenge and delivered by Innovate UK.
The aim of the competition is to:
- investigate early-stage solutions with the potential to substantially improve overall productivity, sustainability, resilience and move existing agricultural sectors to net zero
- prioritise solutions that have positive outputs for farmers, growers or foresters in commercially relevant situations
- accelerate development of effective new agricultural solutions by working with end-users and collaborating with the wider UK research community in the innovation process
This is an expression of interest (EoI) stage of a 2 stage competition. No funding will be awarded at this stage. If your application is successful, you will be invited to apply to a full stage competition.
This 2 stage competition is designed to make funding accessible to a wider range of applicants. If you are successful in the EoI stage, you will be able to access independent support to help complete the full stage application for grant funding. The full stage will open in March 2024.
Your proposal must be able to demonstrate how your project will benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England.
In applying to this competition, you are entering into a competitive process.
This competition closes at 11:00 on 14 February 2024.
Funding type:
Grant
Project size:
Detailed project costs are not required at this EoI stage.
At the full application stage your project’s total costs must be between £28,000 and £56,000.
Your full stage project must:
- have total costs between £28,000 and £56,000
- start by 01 October 2024
- end by 31 March 2026
- last between 6 – 18 months
- carry out all of its project work in the UK
- intend to exploit the results from or in England
Your project must address a significant industry challenge or opportunity in at least one of the four industry subsectors:
- livestock
- plants
- novel food production systems
- bioeconomy and agroforestry
Contact:
You can contact Innovate UK on support@iuk.ukri.org or call 0300 321 4357.
It is recommended that you contact them with at least 15 working days before this competition’s closing date. This will allow for the most suitable support to be put into place.
