On February 12, 2019 Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food Lawrence MacAulay announced the new Canadian Agricultural Strategic Priorities Program (CASPP), an investment of $50.3 million over five years. CASPP is a $10 million per year program of non-repayable contribution funding. The program succeeds the Canadian Agricultural Adaptation Program that ended in March 2019.
Funding available through this program will help facilitate the sector’s ability to address emerging issues and capitalize on opportunities.
The CASPP focuses on four priority areas:
- adoption of new technology;
- environmental sustainability;
- strategic development and capacity building; and
- emerging issues.
Eligible applicants under CASPP are not-for-profit organizations including associations, cooperatives and marketing boards; and indigenous groups. Applicants may apply for non-repayable contributions from AAFC that will not generally exceed $1 million for each project. If approved for funding, eligible project costs will be shared between the applicant and AAFC at a ratio of 50 percent from the applying organization to 50 percent from AAFC.
CASPP will only consider investments to projects that are national or sector-wide in scope. To demonstrate this scope, applicants must make sure that the project:
- involves or is supported by groups or individuals that represent the targeted sector (national or sector-wide); and,
- ultimately benefits the stakeholders of the targeted sector, which includes provision of demonstrable benefit to both public and private participants in the entire sector.
View more information on the Canadian Agricultural Strategic Priorities Program
As the Canadian Horticultural Council is the national association representing the horticultural sector, please submit your ideas for relevant projects to .