The success of the fund continues to grow. To date, Seafish has been involved in more than 60 projects that benefit the seafood industry, with a total value in excess of £3,500,000. In 2011 up to £1 million is available.

We are now inviting submission of proposals for this round of the Seafish Industry Project Fund. The application period opened on 11th August 2010 and closes on 30 September 2010. Applications received after this deadline will not be accepted. Applicants will be informed of the outcome of their proposals by mid-November and successful projects will be announced from April 2011. However, funding will only be made available after the Supreme Court decision.  Successful applicants will then be contacted by a Seafish Project Manager.

In the first instance potential applicants should contact Seafish for initial advice and guidance, and for help in drafting their proposals. There are three key provisos in the application process:

• Each project must fit within one or more of the seven themes Seafish will be working to over the next three years. These are Consumers, Health, Information, Standards, Safety, Environment and Regulation. However the priority areas for funding are Consumers and Health.
• After first discussing the idea with a member of the Seafish staff, applicants will be invited to complete and submit a Concept Form (CF) that summarises the proposed work, together with a letter of support from the main industry sponsor supporting the proposed work. These will be reviewed by a Seafish Advisory Committee.  Applicants requesting over £5,000, whose CFs are reviewed successfully will be invited to submit a detailed Project Proposal Form (PPF), full PPFs will be supplied by Seafish on an individual basis at this stage in the process. The more detailed PPFs will be subjected to a formal review process.
• Each project willhave to be assessed on a value for money (VFM) basis. In the case of a Seafish Industry Project Fund project proposal, measuring the value involves assessing the benefits to industry of the proposed work compared with the costs of doing the work. Each project will need to show measurable benefit to the seafood industry.

For more information

• Visit the Seafish Industry Project Fund page on the Seafood Information Network (SIN).
• Concept Forms can be downloaded from the Seafood Information Network (SIN) at http://sin.seafish.org/portal/site/sin/ipf/  
• SIN is a collaborative site which will store information and background details on all projects and requires registration see: http://sin.seafish.org/portal/site/sin/

For more information on past projects please visit the IPF page on the Seafood Information Network (SIN)