Environment Food and Rural Affairs written question – answered at on 10 March 2005.
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs which applications to her Department for funding under the EU LIFE Directive have been (a) successful, (b) unsuccessful and (c) received but are yet to be determined; and what grants were awarded to each successful project.
The LIFE Regulation was set up by Council Regulation 1973/92/EEC in July 1992, with effect until
The current LIFE Programme has three strands: Environment, Nature and Third Countries. LIFE Environment supports demonstration and pilot projects on methods for the protection and enhancement of the environment with particular emphasis on innovative technologies and new approaches. LIFE Nature supports the implementation of EU nature conservation policy, particularly Natura 2000. Applications from the UK are submitted through Defra to the European Commission for competitive evaluation against those from other member states. LIFE Third Countries funds technical assistance activities for capacity building in non-EU countries bordering the Mediterranean and Baltic Seas which have signed association agreements with the European Union and, therefore, the UK does not submit applications to this strand.
Since 1992, in the UK, LIFE has contributed over €100 million towards 122 innovative demonstration projects through LIFE Environment and 38 nature conservation projects through LIFE Nature.
Co-financing varies from around 30 per cent., where income is generated, to 50 per cent. for LIFE Environment and up to 75 per cent. for some LIFENature projects. On average around 50 per cent. of project costs are co-financed, meaning that the programme has generated around €200 million worth of investment in environment actions.
The current phase of LIFE (LIFE III) has, to date, supported 36 projects in the UK with €47 million of co-financing. Fourteen LIFE Nature projects secured €26.6 million and 22 LIFE Environment projects secured €20.4 million. Annexes 1 and 2, available in the Library of the House, list the projects supported under LIFE Environment and LIFE Nature respectively.
The following table shows, for the UK, the number of applications, number co-financed and amount of co-financing by year for both LIFE Environment and LIFE Nature under the current LIFE III programme.
LIFE Environment | LIFE Nature | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Number of applications | Number Co-financed | Total € million of co-financing | Number of applications | Number Co-financed | Total € million of co-financing | |
2000 | No projects funded as regulation adopted too late in the year | |||||
2001 | 34 | 3 | 1.8 | 10 | 6 | 10.5 |
2002 | 16 | 6 | 5.6 | 11 | 4 | 10.2 |
2003 | 18 | (8)7 | 7.7 | 3 | 2 | 2.1 |
2004 | 24 | 6 | 5.3 | 6 | 2 | 3.8 |
Total | 92 | 22 | 20.4 | 30 | 14 | 26.6 |
(8)Originally nine projects were selected but two projects withdrew before funding commenced.
In the most recent call for projects to commence in 2005, the UK submitted 26 applications to LIFE Environment and three to LIFE Nature. The list of projects to be co-financed will be known in the summer.
Yes2 people think so
No0 people think not
Would you like to ask a question like this yourself? Use our Freedom of Information site.