Find a grant
Details of our range of current grant schemes.
Catchment Sensitive Farming
Encourages best practices for tackling diffuse water pollution from agriculture. Delivered in partnership with the Environment Agency and Defra.
Conservation and Enhancement Scheme
Discretionary payments under agreements available to fund costs of management to deliver favourable condition of the nature conservation interest on Land of outstanding scientific interest.
Environmental Stewardship
An agri-environment scheme with 4 strands:
Higher Level Stewardship (HLS), builds on ELS and OELS to concentrate on individually tailored agreements that deal with more complex types of land management.
Entry Level Stewardship (ELS), Organic Entry Level Stewardship (OELS) and Uplands ELS (UELS), closed for new 2013 applications on 1 September 2013. The scheme will only be open for specific applications in 2014. Please see the Transition
page for more details.
Heritage Management Plan grants
An incentive for landowners to prepare Heritage Management Plans (HMPs) that deliver integrated sustainable management of outstanding land designated or in process of designation as conditionally exempt from inheritance tax.
Local Nature Partnerships fund
This fund has been established to support the creation of self sustaining Local Nature Partnerships and help them respond to Defra's proposals for LNPs as set out in the Natural Environment White Paper.
Soils for Profit (S4P) Project
The Soils for Profit Project provides Farmers in the South West with advice and access to grants to improve the efficiency of their soil, manure and nutrient management.
Closed to new applicants
Access to Nature
To encourage people from all backgrounds to understand, access and enjoy our natural environment. Funded through the Big Lottery Fund Changing Spaces programme.
Aggregates Levy Sustainability Fund
To reduce the effects of aggregate extraction on local communities and the natural environment.
Countdown 2010 Biodiversity Action Fund
To halt biodiversity loss by 2010.
Countryside Stewardship Scheme
An agri-environment scheme superseded by the Environmental Stewardship scheme. Existing CSS agreements continue to be honoured; the last agreements will end in 2014.
Energy Crops Scheme
Provides grants to land managers to plant Miscanthus (Elephant Grass) and Short Rotation Coppice crops to produce biomass energy. Energy crops are used as a substitute for fossil fuels and can help mitigate climate change.
Environmentally Sensitive Areas scheme
An agri-environment scheme for areas of agricultural land that need special protection because of their landscape, wildlife or historical value. The ESA scheme has been superseded by Environmental Stewardship. Existing ESA agreements continue to be honoured; the last agreements will end in 2014.
Environmental Stewardship
Entry Level Stewardship (ELS), Organic Entry Level Stewardship (OELS) and Uplands ELS (UELS), closed for new 2013 applications on 1 September 2013. The scheme will only be open for specific applications in 2014. Please see the Transition page for more details.
Land Purchase Grants
This grant scheme was available to voluntary conservation organisations to assist with the purchase of land of nature conservation importance.
Natural Assets
The Natural Assets grant scheme aimed to tap into the natural potential of the West Midlands to benefit everyone who lives and works there.
Nature Improvement Areas (NIAs)
The NIA grant scheme was established to help address ecological restoration as part of series of actions at a landscape scale to improve biodiversity, ecosystems and our connections with the natural environment.
Organic Farming Scheme
Encouraged the expansion of organic production in England in order to help meet the increasing demand for organically produced food. It was superseded by the Organic Entry Level Scheme in Environmental Stewardship.
Paths for Communities (P4C)
This is a funding scheme set up to develop and enhance the network of Public Rights of Way (PROW) in England in order to deliver benefits to rural areas. Local community partnerships are eligible to bid to Natural England for funds. P4C will operate over a 2 year period from May 2012 to March 2014, with a total fund of £2m.
Reserves Enhancement Scheme
Was for voluntary conservation organisations who manage Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) as nature reserves. These five-year grants contributed to the day to day management of these sites.
Section 35 National Nature Reserve Capital Grants Scheme
Provided funding support of 50 per cent for capital projects which contributed to the improvement of NNR management, access and interpretation. This grant is no longer available pending a review of the scheme in 2006/07.
Wildlife Enhancement Scheme
Was a management agreement scheme for Sites of Special Scientific Interest. Higher Level Stewardship is now the main scheme used to support the management of SSSIs.
Wildspace!
£7,000,000 was distributed to local authorities, wildlife trusts and charitable groups, particularly in disadvantaged areas that lack access to natural open space, to help them create more Local Nature Reserves and enhance existing ones. See Wildspace! projects and publications.
Wetland Vision
A further £4,000,000 was allocated to the Wetland Vision partnership between 2009 and 2011, in support of landscape-scale wetland projects and the delivery of the targets for priority wetland habitats.
