European Fisheries Fund (EFF), England - Guidance
£97m is allocated to the UK under the European Fisheries Fund - the new series of grants for the fishing industry.
Of that there will be about £27m for England plus an extra £7m for Cornwall.
This will become available later in the year to support moving to a sustainable and profitable industry.
To take full advantage the industry needs to be thinking about the future of their businesses now.
The types of project eligible for grant aid include:
- Modernising fishing vessels - e.g. to reduce discards, improve gear selectivity and minimising environmental impact. Not to increase catching capacity;
- Improving product quality;
- Marketing fisheries products;
- Improvements to processing and port facilities.
In England there will be a series of coastal meetings held by the MFA in the next few months to explain what the aims of the grants scheme are and to help people to consider applying.
Projects which align with local plans and strategies for the community stand the best chance of success. The opening and closing dates for project applications will be announced in the coming few months.
A public consultation of the UK Operational Programme (OP) for EFF will be undertaken in two phases. Phase one closed on Friday 4 April.
The final phase of the consultation started on 2 May 2008, and has been conducted separately by the four UK countries to gain a regional perspective.
The consultation closed on 27 June 2008. A summary of the responses can be found via this link (PDF).
The operational programme has been sent to the European Commission for approval.
The Shadow Programme Monitoring Committee will meet on the 9th September 2008 to discuss the selection criteria for approving projects for grant. As soon as they have approved these criteria, application for grants will open in England.
Prior to the opening of an assessment panel the MFA has invited expressions of interest in the form of a short project outline with an estimate of funding requested, source of match funding and timing of project to eff.expressions@mfa.gsi.gov.uk.