Growing Forward 2 Ontario Application Deadline December 11th, 2014

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Affairs, Ontario is home to North America’s third largest food and beverage manufacturing centre, with close to 3,000 multinationals, home-grown giants, and niche companies producing $35 billion in goods annually. With food and beverage processing expected to remain a leading growth engine for the Canadian economy, the federal and provincial governments are continuing to offer funding opportunities to small and medium-sized businesses interested in growth and productivity improvement activities. One of the most significant support programs is Growing Forward 2 (GF2), which offers funding via both federal (Canada) and provincial (Ontario) funding streams. Growing Forward 2’s Ontario provincial variant, Growing Forward 2 Ontario, has one last intake period for Project Implementation applications in 2014 before the 2015 intakes occur, which is from November 10 to December 11, 2014.

Please note that the Capacity Building Stream of GF2 Ontario is open on an ongoing basis.

Growing Forward 2 Ontario Details

The main details of the Growing Forward 2 Ontario funding program are as follows:

• Amount:Maximum $350K non-repayable contribution at up to 35% cost share of projects and 50% for innovative projects. Total amount on capital assets funding capped at $100K.
• Eligible Activities: Costs are stream dependent and include consulting, contractors, incremental hires, incremental materials, supplies, marketing design, print, translation, software projects, trainers and $100k towards new capital assets or alternation/modification to existing assets.
• Eligible Applicants:Ontario based for-profit businesses and collaborations, not-for-profit organizations, or academic institutions.
• Timelines:All projects must end on, or before January 31, 2018 and cannot span across more than 24 months.
  The next application deadline is from November 10 to December 11th, 2014 for project implementation projects.
• Project Themes:Labour Productivity Enhancements, Market Development, Export Growth Plans, Business Strategic planning, Leadership Development, Training, Audits, or Assessments. Also includes Assurance Systems such as ERP Implementation related to Traceability, Bar-code Scanners, Consulting, Hardware, and other Software.

Learn More about Funding Offered through Growing Forward 2 Ontario

Mentor Works offers free workshops and webinars to help inform business owners and leaders of government funding programs available to help grow their businesses. Sign up today to learn more about how to take advantage of many of the great funding opportunities available agri-food producers and processors.