Farming Innovation Programme – Large R&D Partnership Projects (UK)

Deadline: 29-Jun-22

The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) will work with UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) to fund industrial research and experimental development projects that will address major on-farm or immediate post farm gate challenges or opportunities.

UK registered businesses can apply for a share of £8 million for large R&D partnership projects, from the industry-led R&D Partnerships Fund, a part of the Farming Innovation Programme.

The aim of this competition is to:

drive the development and demonstration of solutions that have the potential to substantially improve overall productivity, profitability, and environmental sustainability help the sector mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the effects of climate change
Ensure solutions deliver positive benefits for England's farmers, growers, or foresters in commercially relevant situations
Accelerate research development and demonstration of new agricultural solutions by driving collaboration through active engagement of end users and the wider UK research community in the innovation process
Enable adoption by demonstrating knowledge exchange to the wider sector and other stakeholders.

Specific Themes

Your project must address a significant industry challenge or opportunity in at least one of the industry subsectors below:

Livestock
Seedlings
Novel food production systems
Bioeconomy and agroforestry

Funding Information

Defra and UKRI's Transforming Food Production Challenge have allocated up to £8 million to fund innovation projects in this competition.
If the majority of your organization's work on the project is commercial or economic, your funding request must not exceed the limits below. These limits apply even if your organization normally acts non-economically.
For industrial research projects, you could get funding for your eligible project costs of:
- Up to 70% if you are a micro or small organization
- Up to 60% if you are a medium-sized organization
- Up to 50% if you are a large organization
For experimental development projects which are nearer to market, you could get funding for your eligible project costs of:
- Up to 45% if you are a micro or small organization
- Up to 35% if you are a medium-sized organization
- Up to 25% if you are a large organization

Who can apply ?

Your project must:

Have total costs between £3 million and £5 million
Start by 1 February 2023
End by 31 January 2027
Last up to 48 months
Carry out all of its project work in the UK
Intend to exploit the results from gold in England
Have a minimum of 50% of any grant requested by farmers, growers or foresters, allocated to farmers, growers or foresters based in England

lead organization

To lead a project, your organization must:

Be a UK registered business of any size, collaborate with other UK registered organizations
Be or involve at least one grant claiming micro, small or medium-sized enterprise (SME)
Involve at least one grant claiming academic institution, research and technology organization (RTO), charity, not-for-profit or public sector organization