Farming Futures R&D Fund: low emissions farming

UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £12.5 million for Industrial research projects from the Farming Futures R&D Fund, a part of the Farming Innovation Programme.

Competition opens: Monday 5 May 2025

Competition closes: Wednesday 25 June 2025 11:00am

Description

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has allocated up to £12.5 million to fund innovation projects in this competition.

This funding is part of Defra’s Farming Innovation Programme which is delivered in partnership with Innovate UK.

Defra and UKRI will work in collaboration to deliver a portfolio of projects that meet the objectives of the Farming Innovation Programme.

The aim of this competition is to fund collaborative projects that will develop new solutions to support UK farming working towards achieving low emissions. These must address major on-farm or immediate post farmgate challenges or opportunities.

Projects in this competition must:

• develop ambitious solutions that will reduce emissions in existing farming practices
• carry out a life cycle assessment (LCA) for the solution developed
• demonstrate impact and measure of carbon as a number to facilitate foot printing and potential trading, but other emissions must not be ignored
• demonstrate and measure wider environmental benefits, as contributors to low emission farming
• encourage dissemination and knowledge exchange to the wider sector and increase the maturity or market readiness of emerging solutions
• ensure concepts are closely aligned with industry priorities to deliver business orientated, transformative opportunities

Projects must evidence how the solution will benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England.

Eligibility

Who can apply

Your project

If your application passes the interview selection, any awards given to primary agricultural producers are subject to the green box exemption under the WTO Agreement on Agriculture.

You can see further guidance on green box subsidies here: WTO Guidance for support in Agriculture. Applicants receiving this type of support must ensure that there is minimal to no distortion of trade and comply with the requirements of Annex 2 of the Agriculture Agreement.

Your project must:

• have total costs between £1 million and £2.5 million
• last between 30 and 36 months
• start by 1 January 2026
• end by 31 December 2028
• carry out all of its project work in the UK
• intend to exploit the results from or in England

Scope

Your Proposal

The aim of this competition is to fund collaborative projects that will develop new solutions to support UK farming working towards achieving low emissions. These must address major on-farm or immediate post farmgate challenges or opportunities.

Your project must:

• develop ambitious solutions that will reduce emissions in existing farming practices
• carry out a life cycle assessment (LCA) for the solution developed
• demonstrate impact and measure of carbon as a number to facilitate foot printing and potential trading, but other emissions must not be ignored
• demonstrate and measure wider environmental benefits, as contributors to low emission farming
• encourage dissemination and knowledge exchange to the wider sector and increase the maturity or market readiness of emerging solutions
• ensure concepts are closely aligned with industry priorities to deliver business orientated, transformative opportunities

Your project must also demonstrate how the solution will significantly improve on-farm:

• productivity
• resilience
• sustainability and progression towards low emission farming​

Projects must evidence how the solution will benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England.

We want to fund a variety of projects across different technologies, markets, themes and sectors. We call this a portfolio approach

Specific Themes

Your project must address at least one of the following five key areas:

• Regenerative farming
• Energy
• Methanisation
• Reducing GHG emission in livestock production
• Innovations to support land management

Research categories

We will fund industrial research projects as defined in the guidance on categories of research.

DEFRA

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has allocated up to £12.5 million to fund innovation projects. This competition is in partnership with and delivered by Innovate UK. Funding will be in the form of a grant.

Projects We Will Not Fund

We are not funding projects that:

• are not addressing low emission farming priorities as listed in the scope section
• are not measuring the GHG emissions impact from their innovation
• are equine specific
• involve wild caught fisheries
• involve aquaculture for fish production or human consumption
• are for the production of crops or plants for medicinal or pharmaceutical use
• do not benefit farmers, growers or foresters in England

We cannot fund projects that are:

• dependent on export performance, for example, giving a subsidy to a baker on the condition that it exports a certain quantity of bread to another country
• dependent on domestic inputs usage, for example, giving a subsidy to a baker on the condition that it uses 50% UK flour in their product

Dates

• 5 May 2025 Competition opens
• 8 May 2025 Recorded applicant briefing: recording to follow. 
• 8 May 2025 Online Consortium building event at 10am: register to attend
• 25 June 2025 11:00am Competition closes
• 7 August 2025 Invite to interview
• 15 September 2025Interview panel start
• 26 September 2025 Interview panel end
• 10 October 2025 Applicants notified
• 1 January 2026 Project start by

How to apply

Before you start

You must read the guidance on applying for a competition on the Innovation Funding Service before you start.

Before submitting, it is the lead applicant’s responsibility to make sure:

• that all the information provided in the application is correct
• your proposal meets the eligibility and scope criteria
• all sections of the application are marked as complete
• that all partners have completed all assigned sections and accepted the terms and conditions (T&Cs)

You can reopen your application once submitted, up until the competition deadline. You must resubmit the application before the competition deadline.

What we ask you

The application is split into three sections:

1. Project details.
2. Application questions.
3. Finances.