The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) will invest up to £4.8 million to fund innovation projects in this competition. This is subject to a sufficient number of high quality applications being received.
This funding is part of Defra’s Farming Innovation Programme which is delivered in partnership with Innovate UK.
The aim of this competition is to fund feasibility studies investigating new solutions that will address major on-farm or immediate post farmgate challenges or opportunities.
The funding will support projects to:
- investigate early stage solutions that have the potential to substantially improve the overall productivity, sustainability and resilience of farming, and move existing agricultural sectors to net zero
- prioritise solutions that will have positive outputs for farmers, growers and foresters in commercially relevant situations
- accelerate research and development of new agricultural solutions by actively engaging collaboration with the wider UK research community in the innovation process
Your project must address a significant industry challenge or opportunity in at least one of the four industry subsectors below:
- farmed animals
- plants
- novel food production systems
- bioeconomy and agroforestry
Your proposal must be able to demonstrate how the project will benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England.
Projects must be collaborative, and you must ensure any one partner does not account for more than 70% of the total eligible costs. If you would like help to find a collaboration partner, contact Innovate UK Business Connect’s Agrifood team, and/or attend our Q&A / collaboration building webinar on Tuesday 14 October, 10am-noon.
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To lead a project your organisation must:
- be a UK business of any size, including sole traders and partnerships
- be able to evidence that you are an established commercial business, including sole traders and partnerships
- collaborate with other UK registered organisations
- involve at least one other grant claiming business of any size
Organisations that are not profit driven or do not have a commercial focus, including Community Interest Companies (CICs) and charities, are not allowed to lead in this competition.
To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be a UK registered:
- business of any size including, sole traders and partnerships
- academic institution
- charity
- not for profit
- public sector organisation
- research and technology organisation (RTO)
The farming, growing or forestry businesses applying for grants must be able to evidence that they are an established commercial business and have a UK bank account.
You must ensure no single partner accounts for more than 70% of the total eligible costs.
A business can only lead on one application but can be included as a collaborator in two further applications. If a business is not leading any application, it can collaborate in any number of applications. All non-businesses can collaborate on any number of applications.
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Your project must:
- have total eligible costs of between £200,000 and £500,000
- last up to 24 months
- start by 1 July 2026
- end by 30 June 2028
Any funded organisation needs to carry out their project work in the UK and must intend to exploit the project results from or in the UK.
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The aim of this competition is to fund feasibility studies investigating new solutions that will address major on-farm or immediate post farmgate challenges or opportunities.
Your solutions must significantly improve:
- productivity
- resilience
- sustainability and progression towards low emission farming
Your project must be able to demonstrate how the project will benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England.
Your project must address a significant industry challenge or opportunity in at least one of the four industry subsectors below:
- farmed animals
- plants
- novel food production systems
- bioeconomy and agroforestry
We are not funding projects that:
- do not benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England
- are equine specific
- involve wild caught fisheries
- involve aquaculture for fish production or human consumption
- involve cellular expression of proteins or cultivated meat
- involve acellular production systems, fermentation systems, bacteria, yeast or fungi for human consumption
- are for the production of crops or plants for medicinal or pharmaceutical use
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A pre-recorded briefing webinar is available from Innovate UK. You can also download the slides from the webinar.
For additional support and to find a collaboration partner, attend our Q&A / collaboration building webinar on Tuesday 14 October, 10am-noon.
If you would like help to find a collaboration partner or have other queries, contact Innovate UK Business Connect’s Agrifood team,
Innovate UK's application and funding process
If you need more information about how to apply, please read our funding support pages. For additional support, reach out to our team of innovation experts who are ready to help you navigate the application process and maximise your chances of success.
For more information
Accessibility and Inclusion
Innovate UK welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes making reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us.