Agriculture Development Scheme

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Barry Gardiner)
The Agriculture Development scheme (ADS) is an Exchequer-funded, competitive scheme which has operated in its present form since 2003 to help farmers and other bodies within the food chain to improve their competitiveness through better marketing. Details of the projects that have been supported under ADS may be found on DEFRA's website. The projects that have been supported have, in all cases, been ones that were originally proposed by bodies within the industry itself. The priorities of the scheme have been the encouragement of co-operation and collaboration benefiting primary producers, giving backing to benchmarking and the spread of best practice, promotion and development of assurance schemes, and opening up new markets.

Independent evaluations that have been carried out of the effectiveness of ADS have shown that the projects which it has supported have been highly successful in meeting these objectives, and that the scheme as a whole has been responsible for significantly improving the degree of market orientation shown by the food chain generally. I should like to pay tribute to the energy and commitment of those who have been responsible for delivering these projects, and for achieving these results.

The independent evaluations that I have referred to also made reference to the need to keep the scheme priorities under review, and have pointed out the need for support to be given to projects aimed at achieving specific environmental and sustainability criteria. Accordingly, I have decided that the time has come to reassess the scheme priorities.

After bids have been received for the next ADS panel that will be held later this year, the scheme in its present form will be closed to new applications. Projects currently being supported under ADS will be unaffected. This decision will be publicised via the media and DEFRA's website, and also communicated in writing to agricultural organisations, food chain bodies, and other interested parties. Potential applicants for ADS funding will be given notice of the date by which their bids must be received in order to be considered by the adjudication panel later this year.

It should be noted that after the new 2007-2013 Rural Development Programme for England has been approved by the European Commission, funding may be available under Axis 1 of that programme for projects concerned with the same kinds of priorities as have applied since 2003 under ADS. That funding will be managed by Regional Development Agencies, in line with the regional priorities which each of those Agencies set out in their Axis 1 implementation plans.

A further announcement will be made in due course about successor arrangements for ADS.