South East businesses get £3 million worth of low carbon support

The schemes, which form part of a six-year £30 million regional funding programme aimed at promoting competitiveness in the South East whilst reducing the region’s ecological footprint, are targeting key areas for business sustainability, such as procurement, design and innovation, construction and reduction, re-use and recycling. The South East England Development Agency (SEEDA), which is behind the £2.9 million first funding round, said it hoped that together the projects would deliver an 89,000 tonne reduction in the growth rate of CO2 emissions; create hundreds of jobs and a £3.2 million boost to the region’s economy.

The successful projects, which were chosen in a closed tendering round, includes one led by Reading Borough Council on sustainable procurement; one run by Marine South East and targeting waste reduction and resource-efficient manufacturing in the region’s marine sector; and another run by WSX Enterprise – which manages Business Link in Dorset, Hampshire and Isle of Wight – to get small to medium-sized businesses to incorporate sustainable design into their products and services.

The money for the eight initiatives has been made available through the South East England European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) Competitiveness Programme, which runs from 2007 to 2013, and was approved by the European Commission in December 2007. Under the six-year programme, the ERDF is providing around £15 million with a requirement for match funding. SEEDA, which is managing the programme in the South East, has provided match funding for the first £1.45 million of grants.

Oona Muirhead, SEEDA executive director for Skills and Sustainable Prosperity, said the initiatives would help businesses in the South East cut costs and build profits in a difficult economic climate. “This is good for profit margins and employment as well as for tackling the region’s ecological footprint,” she said. “This latest round of ERDF funding will help ensure projects that can contribute to a successful, sustainable future for the South East don’t fall by the wayside, providing businesses with the resources to drive these projects forward.”

SEEDA said it had recently launched a second round of funding under the ERDF Competitiveness Programme, a key priority of which will be to encourage “micro and small businesses to work together, forming consortia that can better access and benefit from funding”.

As in the first round of funding, it said this second round would aim to improve competitiveness and businesses’ bottom lines through sustainable regional initiatives, which among other areas will tackle sustainable transport.

The amount of funding coming from the ERDF for round two is £7.5 million, which must be matched. Unlike the first round, round two is open to any eligible business or public organisation to apply and the deadline for submissions are June 1.

Gemma Sheldon, senior executive ERDF, said there was a "strict and long process for selecting projects" and that all needed to align with the programme's operational brief. The maximum allocation of ERDF funding per project was £1 million and projects should be between one and three years in length.