Ag Minister David Carter is confident he can come up with a funding package that will deliver more money for agricultural innovation than the recently scrapped Fast Forward Fund reports the Rural News . And while there will be a delay as a new funding structure is established, he says what the Government will put in place will ultimately deliver funds faster than the FFF would have. He says as there are currently no projects of significance relying on the fund, now is a good time to make sure the structure and processes relating to such a fund are sound. Carter was responding to claims by opposition agriculture spokesman Jim Anderton that National had dumped the scheme quietly, and removed $700 million from it, as it was ashamed of doing so. But that's not the case, Carter says."˜This was something we signalled on the campaign trail so we are actually delivering on a promise. It's not about removing money from research and development, it's about developing a transparent process for distributing that money.' Carter says the $700 million that the previous Government put towards the FFF was only transferred to the fund three days before the election - a sign of the haste in which it was put together."˜But that's not to say I think it was all bad. It did have some good points to it. For a start it showed a commitment on behalf of central government to agricultural research and development."˜I also like the co-funding aspect. If you don't get industry buying in at the start then you run the risk of funding work that doesn't have commercial backing.'
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