Ecosystem Resilience and Diversity Fund

The Welsh Government has made available £1million to support the development of projects that ensure that our ecosystems are more resilient and diverse. This ERD fund is administered by CCW, with the applications for funding assessed by the Wales Biodiversity Partnership.

Ecosystems provide us with a wide range of vital services including food, water, timber and energy. They also help us to regulate climate, water, air and soil quality. These services depend on resilient, diverse ecosystems such as heathland, wetlands, woodlands, green urban areas and our rivers and seas.

We need to maintain and restore our biodiversity to improve our ecosystems. This requires long term investment to manage for a diverse range of habitats that provide space for plants and animals to live and thrive into the future.

The type of activities that might be funded include restoring priority habitats such as native woodland and grasslands; improving ecological connectivity; managing the impact of invasive non-native plant and animal species, as well as improving our understanding of ecosystems, the pressures they face and the management required to improve resilience.

Local government and National Parks, statutory agencies, universities, non-government organisations and other voluntary groups can apply for funding of between £10,000 and £200,000. The fund can provide up to 100% of eligible costs.

The application window opens on 8 May and closes on 1 June 2012. All completed applications forms should be submitted electronically to erd.fund@ccw.gov.uk

This funding supports the Welsh Government’s commitment to the ecosystem approach set out in “Sustaining a Living Wales”.

This fund is not part of CCW’s own grant programme.

Application for the ERD Fund

The Annexes to the application are:

ERD fund criteria.
Contacts for the WBP groups.
Information on priority mapping work for terrestrial ecosystems.
CCW travel and subsistence rates.

These can be found within the application form.

Please send the form electronically to the e-mail below by 5pm on 1 June 2012. If you cannot submit electronically please let us know using the same e-mail and we will discuss alternatives.

E-mail: erd.fund@ccw.gov.uk

Guidelines for filling in the application form

The guidelines about the fund includes information on what can and cannot be funded and who can apply as well as setting out important dates.
The guidelines on filling in the form provide a step by step guide to the questions and you should refer to these as you go through the form to ensure that you include relevant information to support the assessment process.
Please also refer to the criteria (annex 1 of the application form).
Remember to use the check list to make sure that you have included all the supporting information required.

Note: The guidelines have now been updated - 17th May 2012

An inconsistency has been picked up in the guidelines.

Under 'Section 4: Additional Information Requested' the fourth bullet point should read as follows: