To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many grant applications for Regional Development Programme for England money each regional development agency has received for (a) up to £5,000, (b) £5,001 to £100,000, (c) £100,001 to £1,000,000 and (d) over £1,000,000 since 1 January 2007. (215411)

The regional development agencies (RDAs) have been responsible for managing the delivery of the social and economic elements of the Rural Development Programme for England since the programme was formally launched at the beginning of 2008. DEFRA has agreed with RDAs that delivery of the socio-economic measures of the RDPE will take a more strategic approach and will include a significant element of procured or commissioned activity, rather than solely being delivered by an individual application led approach. In addition, some RDPE investment will be through the bottom-up Leader approach. Under Leader Local Action Groups (LAGs) will be allocated individual budgets to fund projects that are part of an agreed Local Development Strategy. The process of agreeing and allocating funds to LAGs is currently under way across regions.

The number of grant applications by value of individual project received by each agency is set out in the following table.

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much each regional development agency has allocated from the Regional Development Programme for England to specific projects since 1 January 2007; and how many such allocations were for (a) up to £5,000, (b) £5,001 to £100,000, (c) £100,001 to £1,000,000 and (d) over £1,000,000. (215412)

The regional development agencies have only been able to commit funding to projects under the Rural Development Programme for England since 1 January 2008.

The total amounts each agency has committed are shown in the following table.