The Growing Kent & Medway project is designed to deliver an uplift in Kent and Medway’s economy through inclusive and innovation-led growth. The cluster focuses on the region’s advanced horticulture, fresh produce packaging, food and drink processing industries, and enabling technologies that drive innovation and growth. They will be holding a briefing session for businesses and researchers on the 11th May 202111 am11am to allow you the opportunity to find out more about the project and ask any questions you may have.

Growing Kent and Medway is a new, 5-year £18 million programme to improve the region’s horticulture, viticulture and agri-tech sectors. Funded by the UK government’s ‘Strength in Places Fund’, the programme is led by NIAB-EMR with partners including the University of Kent, University of Greenwich, Produced in Kent and a range of regional food companies. Our aim is to work with numerous – in fact, hundreds – of companies and individuals to provide mentoring, entrepreneurship and scientific advice.

NIAB-EMR is generating a Greentech Hub for Advanced Horticultural Production – a state of the art glasshouse and propagation unit for collaborative R&D and demonstration of agri-tech innovations.

The University of Kent will develop a Mentoring Hub to provide specialist advice on how to market your business and promote your products, and a Biotechnology Hub for Sustainable Food and Drink, to apply high-tech approaches to areas such as the production of high value compounds from plant material and waste, pathogen identification and control, and maintenance of healthy soil.

The University of Greenwich will establish a Food Innovation Lab, to include a “maker space” for beneficiaries to use for research and product development. Finally, the consortium will soon launch a regional £5 million collaborative grant fund, which will award grants of between £10,000 and £150,000 for small- and larger-scale R&D grants led by regional companies working with research organisations such as those listed above. Throughout the programme, they will work with key regional organisations, and we urge interested parties to contact us if you are interested in knowing more about our programme – see the GK&M website: https://www.growingkentandmedway.com.

They are inviting organisations and academics to deliver a short 2 min pitch to advertise the technology/skills they can offer and/or what they are looking for from potential partners. Please complete this form if you are interested in pitching https://forms.gle/j41JFaTG83swyGnX7