Welsh farm support changed in 2026. The old capital schemes closed and the Sustainable Farming Scheme's Optional Layer is replacing them one category at a time. This is what pays towards a roof, a store, a clamp or a yard today, what has been announced, and the rules that apply before you spend a pound.
Statuses and figures checked against gov.wales on 24 September 2026. Nothing here is English: Welsh schemes, Welsh rules.
Four Optional Layer categories touch buildings or yards. One is open. Two have been described in the Welsh Government's March 2026 overview with headline figures, but their guidance, scoring and application windows have not been published, so anything more precise than what is written here is a guess.
Open now · 17 September 2026
SFS Optional: Small Infrastructure
£3,000 to £15,000, at a standard rate (40% of a standard cost)
New roofs over existing areas with no current roof covering. It does not fund a new building, and a roofed area must not become livestock housing.
Check your yard against the rulesAnnounced, not yet open
SFS Optional: Infrastructure and Equipment
£12,000 to £50,000, 40% of the lowest quote, 50% for certain items in relation to slurry storage and management
The overview describes it as similar to the Nutrient Management Investment Scheme, which did not fund the construction of livestock housing. Whether that exclusion carries over is not published.
Universal Layer only: biosecurity items, which also need the biosecurity assessment under UA12 to have been completed.
Announced, not yet open
SFS Optional: Capital: Environment
£500 to £20,000, at a standard rate
Gutters, downpipes and drains, not the roof they hang off. Its other main actions are hedgerows, walls, trees and ponds.
Guidance published · 28 July 2026
SFS Optional: Capital: Production and Efficiency
£500 to £15,000, at a standard rate (40% of a standard cost)
Equipment only: handling systems, crushes, weighing, EID, precision application, water harvesting and filtering, sensors. No buildings, roofs or stores.
Selection is scored and budget-limited in every category, and farms in the SFS Universal Layer get extra points. Being eligible is not the same as being selected.
The same test runs across the Optional Layer, whether or not you have entered the Universal Layer: you farm agricultural land in Wales, you have at least 3 hectares of eligible land registered with Rural Payments Wales or can show more than 550 standard labour hours, and you have management control of the land for at least 10 months of the year.
If you are in the Universal Layer, your eligibility has already been checked and you apply through the dashboard on RPW Online. If you are not, the same figures apply and you evidence them with the application. Either way you need a Customer Reference Number.
The rule that catches people: nothing bought, ordered, deposited or started before the Grant Award Letter is eligible. That includes the frame. It does not include getting a design and a price, which you can and should do before you apply. For a category that asks for quotes, you cannot apply without them.
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Pounds you can spend on the building before the award letter arrives and still have the grant pay towards it.
Two consents need to be started early, because the claim needs evidence of both. Planning: a farm building is often agricultural permitted development, which in Wales usually still means a prior notification, and the council has 28 days to say whether it wants to approve the siting and design. Infrastructure and Equipment goes further and asks for a planning application to be submitted with the grant application. Drainage: any construction of 100 m² or more needs SuDS Approval Body approval before work starts, and a roof is exactly the kind of construction it means. The planning guide has both in full.
Small Infrastructure pays for a roof over an area already in use, with no roof on it now, and the roofed area must not become livestock housing afterwards. Infrastructure and Equipment is described as similar to the Nutrient Management Investment Scheme, whose last window closed on 5 September 2025 and which listed the construction of livestock housing as ineligible in every window it ran. Whether that carries over is not published yet.
So plan a new shed on its own merits. The grant money is for what stands beside it: the roof over the collecting yard, the covered muck store, the silage clamp, the isolation pen, the slurry store and its cover. Those are steel-framed jobs too, and they are what this site prices.
Infrastructure and Equipment will fund a share of the real cost, not a standard cost, so the overview says you submit 3 quotes and the grant is offered in line with the lowest. The Welsh Government's rural grants tendering guidance, which the previous scheme used, sets the mechanics: an item under £1,000 before VAT needs no written quote, from £1,000 one, and from £5,000 three. All obtained before you buy, with every supplier given the same information and the same time to reply. You are expected to take the cheapest; if you do not, you write down why, and the grant may be capped at the lowest anyway.
A quote has to identify the supplier: trading title, address, contact details and company registration number (VAT number if applicable). Quotes from family, or from a business you have an interest in, must be declared. Second-hand equipment is allowed with at least 5 years' life left, if it is safe and fit for purpose.
South West Steel Buildings can be one of your three. Send the same specification to us and to two others, give everyone the same deadline, and let the prices decide. Our quote carries the company details the guidance asks for and comes with the engineer's calculations, which the claim will need.
There is no calculator for Infrastructure and Equipment on this site, because there are no published rates to calculate from, and a made-up figure is worse than none. What you can do now is the part that takes longest: the design, the quotes and the planning application, which the overview says goes in with the grant application. Tell us what you are planning and South West Steel Buildings will design and price it, so the quote is ready when the window is.
A covered muck store, a clamp, a yard roof over the cap for Small Infrastructure, an isolation building — say what it is and roughly how big. You get a design and a quote you can put in with the other two.
Approximate is fine. Nobody expects you to have decided — it just means the first reply can be useful rather than a list of questions.
Every enquiry gets a reply the same day, and your figures go with it. The building itself is designed and priced by South West Steel Buildings, our building partner, so your details go to them too, and they will be in touch. How we handle your details.
One that pays for a structure: SFS Optional: Small Infrastructure, which pays £40 a square metre towards a new roof over an existing livestock feeding area, gathering area or manure store, from £3,000 to £15,000 per business per financial year. The larger SFS Optional: Infrastructure and Equipment category, for slurry stores, covered manure stores, silage clamps, yard roofs and isolation facilities at £12,000 to £50,000, has been announced but had not opened when this page was last checked. Capital: Environment, which includes guttering, downpipes and clean and dirty water separation, is in the same position.
Not one that has been published. Small Infrastructure pays for a roof over an area already in use, not a new building, and the roofed area must not become housing. Infrastructure and Equipment is described as similar to the Nutrient Management Investment Scheme, which listed the construction of livestock housing as ineligible in every window; whether that carries over will only be known when its guidance is published. Plan a new shed on its own merits, and treat any grant as a bonus for the yard, store or clamp beside it.
Under the Welsh Government's rural grants tendering guidance, an item costing £5,000 or more before VAT needs three written quotes, obtained before you buy, with every supplier given the same information and the same time to reply. You are expected to take the cheapest, or to explain in writing why not, and the grant may be capped at the lowest quote either way. Quotes from family or from a business you have an interest in must be declared. Infrastructure and Equipment says it will fund in line with the lowest of the three, so the quote that wins is the one that sets the grant.
No. Under Small Infrastructure, and under the Nutrient Management Investment Scheme before it, ordering, paying a deposit or starting work before the grant award letter arrives makes the item ineligible, and there is no reason to expect the new categories to differ. Getting a design and a price before you apply is fine, and for a scheme that asks for quotes it is required; committing to it is not. Planning and drainage approval can and should be started early, because the claim needs evidence of both.
Every status and figure on this page was read from the Welsh Government pages below on 24 September 2026. If a page below and this one ever disagree, the Welsh Government's is right. The announced categories will move to their own scheme pages when they open; the optional layer index is where they appear first.
Send the yard, store or clamp you have in mind and South West Steel Buildings will design and price it, with the pad sizes your groundworker needs. Pricing before the award letter is fine; ordering is not.