Warwickshire farm in the land of milk and honey after REG
A WARWICKSHIRE farm has improved its commercial viability after securing funding to transform a former milking shed into a honey processing facility.
Tomlow Honey was set up by amateur beekeeper David Stott in 2001 and based at Thorn Furlong Farm in Stockton.
The business now produces 16,000 lbs of honey each year and in order to adequately meet customer demand, Mr Stott applied for funding from the Rural Enterprise Grant (REG) programme to enable him to take the company to the next level.
As assessing the bid, REG fund managers approved a £17,000 grant to renovate the farm building and install equipment which will enable Mr Stott to speed up the honey extraction process four-fold.
“This new facility has helped make a step change in capacity, more than doubling the amount of honey we can produce,” he said.
“The REG funding has helped move this along much faster than we would otherwise have been able to and will really make a difference to what we can achieve as a business.”
Funded under the Rural Development Programme for England (RDPE) which is managed by Advantage West Midlands and administered by Herefordshire Council, REGs are available for farmers and micro businesses developing and diversifying into food and drink, environmental technologies and tourism improvements.
Funding of up to 40% (or £62,500) can be secured towards projects that range from new processing machinery and supply chain equipment and improvements to tourism experiences.
Dorothy Coleman, REG Programme Manager, said: “In just a decade, Tomlow Honey has gone from a spare time occupation to a company whose produce is in demand across Warwickshire and beyond.
“It was clear that the production process needed to be much more professional if the company was going to expand and we are delighted to have been able to help with this.”
The Rural Enterprise Grant (REG) has been successfully supporting farmers and rural businesses for over two years and to date has approved over £2m in grants. The project steering group has recently reviewed the eligibility criteria and extended the range of activities eligible to rural businesses.
In addition to projects linked to priorities like tourism, food and drink and environmental technologies, farmers can now apply for grant funding linked to Care Farming, education, on-farm retailing, farm shops and non-food processing.
