The Technology Strategy Board, in partnership with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and the Scottish Government is launching a collaborative R&D competition with up to £15 million available to invest in projects focusing on the challenge of sustainable protein production.

As global demand for animal products increases, demand for vegetable proteins as animal feedstock also rises. The UK faces a shortfall in domestic vegetable protein production capability, which we are seeking to help food producers overcome.

The competition opens on 4 April 2011 and will have two interrelated core themes:

• Increasing domestic supply of sustainably produced vegetable protein for farmed animals (including land and marine based aquaculture)
• Increasing production efficiency and sustainability of domestically supplied animal and fish protein for food, and reducing waste in the food chain to the point of retail sale.

The projects should be business-led and seek to develop new products or processes. Most of the funding is expected to be allocated to proposals in the applied R&D (attracting up to 50% funding) or experimental development (up to 25% funding) categories.