Welcome to the MENTERRA website that has been designed to provide background to the project, log articles and information about the various trials as well as providing useful links. The Product Packages summarise the findings of these trials and provide a comprehensive guide to those who wish to further develop the crops.

MENTERRA was launched in 2003 with a £2.6 million funding package secured through the Objective One programme, the Welsh Assembly Government, the Welsh Development Agency, University of Wales Bangor and Gwynedd Council. It was an ambitious and innovative three-year long pilot project, since extended to September 2007, aiming to develop new crops and plants, as well as traditional and indigenous ones.

MENTERRA has been managed and co-ordinated by Gwynedd Council and the objective has been to link academic research work of new produce and products with the potential processing and marketing opportunities. The project co-operated with farmers to develop these new and pioneering initiatives, so that they could in due course produce and market products, aiming to lay the foundations for the development of processing facilities in order that Gwynedd’s economy could benefit from developments on farms within the county.

Part of the funding was used to establish the new Agri-Innovation Research Centre at Henfaes, Abergwyngregyn, and the project has operated in partnership with 3 other organisations within the county :-

The School of Agricultural and Forest Sciences (now known as School of the Environment and Natural Resources) University of Wales Bangor undertaking scientific crop research and development

Cymad liaising with local farmers

BIC Innovation responsible for surveying the market and commercialising new produce.

Click on the Partners individually for full details of their role within the project.

Menterra, National Eisteddfod 2005