The Accelerating Development of Practices and Technologies (ADOPT) Fund offers grants to farmers and farm businesses to trial new technology and practices on farm.
It aims to speed up the development and adoption of new ideas, so more farmers can put them into practice sooner.
As Round 6 of the full ADOPT grant opens today, we hear from two farmers who have received ADOPT funding. Thomas Slattery from the Support Hub, which helps applicants prepare, speaks to Bryony Graham in Essex and Peter Southwell in East Yorkshire.
They share why they applied, what they’re testing, and how the funding is helping them.
Tom explains that problem-solving is already part of everyday farming:
“Farmers are already innovators. Any given week, most farmers are problem-solving across multiple domains. You’re constantly adapting systems, tweaking processes and making judgement calls based on, frankly, incomplete information. So, for a lot of farmers, this isn’t called innovation. It’s just farming.”
Bryony describes how she is trialling willow as a high-carbon crop and testing compost mixes as a peat-free growing medium that could be used more widely on arable farms:
“We are looking at whether we can produce a willow-based compost or mulch for sale into the commercial horticulture sector. It’s about using a methodology that is reproducible on a farm with normal farm equipment, with no special kit.”
Peter shares how ADOPT has supported the Yorkshire Nutrition Club to bring farmers together to share data, compare crop nutrition strategies and test new approaches side by side:
“ADOPT came along, and we thought maybe we can get a group of farmers together who can compare new technologies and also compare their own systems to each other. So, we thought with the combination of the benchmarking and the testing, it would be a good project to try.”
Apply for ADOPT fundingUp to £5 million is available in Round 6.
Two types of grants are available:
Full ADOPT grant for on-farm trial and demonstration projects to improve adoption of new ideas or solutions in the agricultural sector. Projects must have total costs of between £50,000 and £100,000Opens: Thursday 5 February 2026
Closes: Wednesday 8 April 2026 11:00am
ADOPT Facilitator Support Grant of £2,500 for a farmer, grower or forester based in England to engage an external Project Facilitator to support submissions to the Full ADOPT Grant competitionOpened: Thursday 15 January 2026
Closes: Wednesday 25 February 2026 11:00am
Help with your application ADOPT Support HubIf you have any questions about the fund, the ADOPT Support Hub can help.
Run by RSK ADAS and commissioned to support ADOPT, it:
acts as a first point of contact, providing advice on scope, suitability and on-farm trial practicalities helps connect you with the expertise, partners and capabilities needed for a full grant application promotes best practice standards for on-farm R&D supports sharing learning and outputs from funded projects, so more farmers can benefit Watch the webinarA webinar delivered by Innovate UK was held last year for anyone interested in ADOPT. It covers the application process and what you need to know before submitting.
Watch the ADOPT funding opportunity information webinar.
ADOPT is part of the Farming Innovation Programme, delivered in partnership with Innovate UK.
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seen at 11:39, 5 February in Farming.