Regional economic downturn open call (17 November – 5 December 2008)

This call is specifically focused on projects which can support regional business to retain their competitive position and safeguard jobs in the current economic downturn.

A maximum of £7m revenue investment is being allocated through this call.  The minimum ERDF funding request is £500,000. (i.e. £1m total eligible project cost, assuming ERDF at 50% grant rate).

The PMC has agreed that the maximum project approval will not exceed three years. Eligible activities are set out in more detail in Table 2 of the Commissioning Document below and include:

• Actions to improve the productivity and efficiency of SMEs
• Promoting of finance for business and the provision of access to it
• Grants for business investment
• Support for innovation in SMEs
• Actions to promote international sales and marketing development
• Promotion of resource efficiency within SMEs.

This call is open from Monday 17 November 2008 to Friday 5 December 2008 at 5:00pm.

Proposals may be considered for this call where projects/operations:

• can demonstrate a strong strategic fit with the priorities of the Operational Programme
• are worked up, deliverable and can demonstrate they require urgent approval in order to commence delivery in the current financial year (i.e. by 31 March 2009)
• have evidence that the required match funding is secured or is at a significantly advanced stage
• can demonstrate they are entirely consistent with Business Support Simplification Programme (BSSP)
• represent an appropriate and swift response to current economic issues, and can be delivered without prejudice to existing business support services.

Further detail in respect of ERDF requirements is set out in the Commissioning Document for the call directly below, together with the following pieces of guidance documentation:

Economic downturn open call commissioning document
Project initiation and planning (PIP) form
PIP finance table
Process guidance document

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Historic information on previous calls:

Open call for proposals (20 May to 31 July 2008)

This call is now closed to new applicants.

The first call for projects meeting the priorities of innovation and business growth and enterprise ran from 20 May until 12 noon on 31 July 2008.

This was the first of a series of calls for project proposals over the life of the 2007-13 ERDF programme, seeking projects which either had already started or were due to start before 31 December 2008, i.e. those requiring retrospective or urgent approval.

Project proposals were considered for this call where projects/operations:

• can demonstrate a strong strategic fit with the priorities of the Operational Programme
• are (1) worked up, deliverable and can demonstrate they require urgent approval in order to commence delivery in the current calendar year (i.e. by the end of December 2008) or (2) are fully eligible for and can demonstrate the requirement for retrospective funding if required (retrospection is potentially available from 1 January 2007)
• have evidence that the required match funding is secured or negotiations are at a significantly advanced stage
• can demonstrate that they are consistent with the Business Support Simplification Programme (BSSP).

£15m was available for each priority.  The call was made against a commissioning document for each priority, inviting applications which will be shaped by the activities, outputs and outcomes the programme seeks to achieve.

Supporting Documents and Downloads

ERDF P1 commissioning doc [doc] (185 KB)

ERDF P2 commissioning doc [doc] (223 KB)

ERDF open call process [doc] (114 KB)

ERDF expression of interest form [doc] (120 KB)