§ Mr. DrewTo ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what support is available to fund the South West Plan for Sustainable Farming and Food. [178202]
§ Alun MichaelThe delivery plan for Sustainable Farming and Food (SFF) in the South West, "Making a difference", was launched on 26 May after extensive consultation. It has been drawn up by the stakeholders who will be responsible for implementing the actions detailed within it.
The delivery of the South West plan, as with all of the SFF regional delivery plans, will be facilitated by many public body and industry representatives and these organisations will work together with both resource and funding support to deliver the vision detailed in the plan. They are making use of Government grants, industry support and the resources of the Government Office and Regional Development Agency, as well as other Government bodies participating in the regional steering group. In particular, existing support programmes, including the England Rural Development Programme and the objective 1 agriculture programme in Cornwall, have been targeted to deliver the SFF plan; also the Regional Development Agency is making considerable resources available to support delivery of the plan. Given the number of public and industry bodies contributing to delivery of the plan, it is not possible precisely to quantify the level of support available to fund the plan.