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About the Seed Sourcing Grant

The Seed Sourcing Grant (SSG) is a competitive grant to provide support for activities that enhance the quality, quantity, and diversity of tree seed sources in England. The government aims to at least treble tree planting rates in England by 2025 and has set legally binding targets to increase tree and woodland cover to 16.5% of total land area by 2050.

The SSG will help to ensure the availability of planting stock to meet these targets.

The SSG supports projects that will increase the quality, quantity, and diversity of seed stands and seed orchards on the Forest Reproductive Material (FRM) Register of UK Basic Material. See Marketing forest reproductive material for forestry purposes for more details.

Technical experts have developed a set of recommended Tree Seed Species Strategies (PDF, 864 KB, 64 pages).

The strategies cover 21 species that have been identified as a priority for support. They provide suggested ideal approaches to enhance the quality, quantity, and diversity of registered seed stands and orchards for these species. Delivery of these strategies is the priority for financial support from the SSG, which is reflected in the grant evaluation criteria and payment rates. However, given the likely uplift in seed requirement of all kinds to meet planting targets, the scheme is open to proposals covering all species included in the UK FRM scheme including the voluntary scheme.

Guelder rose and wych elm were previously identified as priority species but have been removed as several projects to address these strategies are currently underway. However, they are still eligible for 50% funding as a non-priority species.

Successful projects and case studies

Read about previous successful seed sourcing projects.

Read our tree and seed production case studies to find out how funding helped landowners, nurseries and other organisations.

What funding is available?

Up to 260,000 of funding is available through the SSG, subject to sufficient high-quality bids being received.

All activities related to the 21 priority species seed sourcing strategies will be funded at 100%, and other projects will be funded at 50%.

If applying for a non-priority species, you should consider the source of your match funding before applying and explain this in your application. You may not source match funding from another Nature for Climate Fund funded grant.

Projects must have a minimum total cost of 2,000 to be eligible for funding. You may submit more than one bid during each funding round, but each lead applicant may only apply for a maximum of 75,000 per annum, across all their bids in each funding round.

Funding is available for the 2024-2025 financial year only. All items must be received and work completed between 1 April 2024 and 27 March 2025. Before applying, please make sure you are confident that you can complete all activities and receive all items before this date. Any spend after this date will not be eligible to claim for.

If you are following a recommendation from the priority species strategies that you cannot complete fully by 27 March 2025, you should demonstrate the outputs that will be achieved in the funding period and how these contribute to the grant objectives. You should also explain any future plans beyond the funding period and how the work in your SSG proposal would contribute to these.

Eligible activities and costs

Proposals can include a combination of these activities:

1. Management of existing seed stands, to ensure they are productive for seed collectors e.g., thinning, improving access, or installing fencing. Seed stands must either already be registered on the National Register of Basic Material or should be registered on the National Register of Basic Material as part of the proposed project. This may include bringing current source-identified seed sources under management and registering them as a seed stand as part of the project. These must be time-bound rather than ongoing activities.

2. Desk studies and field studies to identify and bring additional seed stands onto the National Register of Basic Material.

3. Planning and planting of new seed stands, and their registration on the National Register of Basic Material.

4. Planning and planting of new seed orchards and their registration on the National Register of Basic Material.

To be eligible for funding:

• the project proposal must be relevant to the production of tree seed fromspecies covered by the UK FRM scheme (including those in the voluntary scheme)
• the seed stand or seed orchard must be in England
• the work to be funded must not have commenced, and must not commence until a funding agreement is in place
• activities must be associated with one of the eligible FRM categories below

Eligible categories of FRM:

• source-identified seed stands
• selected and tested seed stands
• qualified and tested seed orchards

Source-identified seed sources are also eligible for funding under this grant if they meet the criteria to be registered as source-identified seed stands and are registered as seed stands as part of the proposed project.

Eligible costs that may be claimed for include but are not limited to:

• staff, or contractor, costs for project delivery, including for research and technical advice
• seeds and saplings
• consumables and temporary infrastructure required for management of seed stands, for example fencing
• contribution sought towards costs of equipment required to complete the project. For equipment over 500, the contribution offered will be at the evaluation panels discretion
• travel and subsistence specifically for the SSG grant activity, carried out in the most economically and sustainable way possible

The following expenditure is ineligible:

• ongoing maintenance of seed stand and/or seed orchard after the project delivery window
• insurance for capital items or staff
• repairs and ongoing maintenance to existing or purchased equipment
• any other travel and subsistence (inclusive of other grant schemes)
• costs or overheads such as rent, and utilities apportioned to those staff directly or indirectly employed on the project.
• costs incurred outside of the project delivery window
• costs involved in preparing your application or work on another grant scheme
• retrospective funding for work that has already been started/carried out before grant agreement
• capital items relating to seed processing or storage
• business as usual seed collection

Am I eligible?

The SSG is open to any UK-based public, private, or third sector organisation that can demonstrate how the grant will be used to enhance the quality, quantity, and diversity of English seed stands and seed orchards. Individual private landowners may also apply for eligible activities on their own land.

Previous applicants to the SSG, whether successful or unsuccessful, can reapply in this round.

Applicants to the SSG could include:

• public and private sector tree nurseries and tree seed suppliers
• research institutes including public sector research establishments
• landowners including private and public landowners and NGOs, agents may make an application on behalf of a landowner
• NGOs working on tree improvement and other aspects of seed
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