Transition Funding
Scope of the available funding
Funding is available to producers on mainland Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales) and producers on the isles of Bute and Skye, that have cattle aged over 48 months that have died or been killed on farm other than for human consumption. Funding is not available for fallen cattle from other areas of GB as these areas are derogated from the TSE requirement to test fallen cattle. Derogated areas are set out in below.
The transitional funding contributes only towards the cost of collection and disposal of these cattle through an approved sampling site. Defra will continue to pay the cost of taking and analyising brainstem samples and these payments will be made directly to sampling sites and the Veterinary Laboratories Agency (VLA) respectively. State aid cover for sampling and analysis costs are covered under the separate TSE Surveillance state aid notification (Aid No N 489/2007) which remains in place and unchanged
Eligibility
To be eligible for funding all of the following criteria must be met:
- Applicants must be agricultural producers;
- Applicants must be situated within mainland GB or Bute or Skye;
- fallen cattle must be aged over 48 months and require a BSE test;
- Applicants must meet the description of a Small or Medium sized Enterprise in that they employ less than 250 people and have a turnover of less than 50 million euros per year.
Exclusions
The transitional funding will not be applicable to any of the follow categories:
- Fallen cattle aged under 48 months at death;
- Other species of non-bovine fallen stock;
- Carcases collected from outside of GB or from producers in areas derogated from the requirement to test fallen cattle for BSE (see Q & A below);
- Carcases submitted by producers who are not ‘active’ members of NFSCo, i. e. non-members or members suspended from the Company at the time;
- Collections made by private arrangement outside of the National Fallen Stock Company;
- Carcases delivered to a sampling site by a producer;
- Carcases collected from large businesses or individuals or organisations that are not a primary producers or not acting on behalf of a primary producer (for example: abattoirs, research centres etc);
- Carcases that are not sent to an approved sampling site.
How the scheme will operate
The £2m funding will be available from 12 January 2009 to 31 December 2009 and will only be available through the NFSCo which operates the voluntary National Fallen Stock Scheme (NFSS).
Producers who are not already members of NFSCo will need to join by calling NFSCo on 0845 054 8888. Further details on joining NFSCo are provided in the Q & A or at: www.nfsco.co.uk.
Once registered, members will receive a list of collectors operating in their area along with the prices they charge. Members should contact their NFSCo collector of choice directly to arrange collection. Once the collection has taken place the collector will enter details of the job on NFSCo’s database and the member will be billed for their share of the cost (total cost less the Government contribution).
NFSCo do not charge a membership fee but do require members to set up a direct debit facility and apply an administration fee for each monthly statement issued to members of £1.75 for statements issued by post and £1.25 for electronic versions. Statements and fees will only be applied to the month in which the member uses the service – if you do not use the service in a particular month you do not receive a statement and do not incur a fee.
The subsidy will be paid on a percentage basis and the level will be set by NFSCo. The subsidy is expected to start at approximately 20% reducing during the course of the year on a generally digressive basis according to uptake.
Producers are free to make their own arrangements outside of the NFSS or to deliver carcases themselves but these arrangements will not be eligible for funding.
State aid
This scheme complies with Article 16f of Commission Regulation 1857/2006. The aid intensity for the collection and disposal of fallen stock that require TSE testing can be to 100% which is in accordance with Article 16 of 1857/2006.
The scheme is only open to small and medium sized enterprises (SME) as defined in Article 2.6 of Commission Regulation 1857/2006.
The scheme will not provide any direct payments to the livestock owners in accordance with Article 16.3 of Commission Regulation 1857/2006.
- The State Aid summary form can be found here.
