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Summary of the local place

South Hams, in South Devon is a rural, coastal location with market/coastal towns dispersed throughout the district. South Hams suffers from poor transport infrastructure and accessibility and a relative dominance of sectors synonymous with low rates of productivity. Much of the area is affluent but higher wages tend to be earned outside the district and there is a particularly large disparity between house prices and wages.

Map of South Hams

South Hams has secured 拢1.06 million of United Kingdon Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) funding. The Investment Plan is shaped by four themes; active and inclusive travel, agri-tech and regenerative farming; marine economy and decarbonisation and wider business support and consultancy. These four themes underpin an overarching theme for the programme in South Hams, to support Clean Economic Growth. South Hams is delivering UKSPF activity under two of the UKSPF investment priorities: Communities and Place where 14% (拢152,000) of the funding has been allocated and Supporting Local Businesses which has received 86% (拢910,000) of the funding allocation.

The programme of funded activity delivered in South Hams largely mirrors that being delivered in the neighbouring authority area of West Devon. Most contracts (interventions) have been awarded to the same delivery partner with the only difference in scope of work associated with the emphasis in South Hams on the marine economy.

Interventions being offered through the UKSPF Programme include, under the Communities and Place investment priority, the development of a local cycle and walking infrastructure plan, and under the Supporting Local Businesses investment priory, interventions include:

• agri-tech and regenerative farming activities that seek to boost innovation, productive land, increased biodiversity and enhanced access to markets
• support targeted at the marine sector through the development of a strategy to better understand the sector and decarbonisation pilots for the local authority鈥檚 fleet of vessels and that raises awareness of opportunities to reduce the carbon footprint within the sector
• support to businesses across all industry sectors to decarbonise

South Hams UKSPF programme is closely aligned to funding opportunities through the Rural England Prosperity Fund (REPF). Across several projects UKSPF interventions are providing the support to identify routes to decarbonisation with REPF grant funding enabling the delivery of that decarbonisation activity.

Unit of analysis

The tight focus in the programme on the Supporting Local Businesses investment priority (where 86% of the funding is being invested) in decarbonisation and R&D, alongside a clear sectoral emphasis, provides the ability for targeted impact analysis of:

• businesses (cross-sector) supported to develop decarbonisation plans
• farms/landowners who have been supported in regenerative farming practices, piloting new and emerging technologies or in bringing new products and services to market

Methodological approach

Process evaluation

The process evaluation will analyse core areas including fund design, fund implementation, delivery of interventions and data collection & monitoring. It will also involve:

• a review of the local context at the interim and final stages of UKSPF
• analysis of monitoring information (MI) to evidence South Ham鈥檚 progress of delivery of the programme
• stakeholder research and in-depth qualitative research to explore the set-up and implementation of the UKSPF investment in South Hams

Impact evaluation

Quasi-experimental design (QED) approaches have been considered for each element of the evaluation, The conclusion is that there is most potential for the application of counterfactual impact evaluation methods across the business support interventions associated with knowledge transfer and innovation (within the agricultural sector) and in relation to business support for decarbonisation activities more generally. However, the projects are operating at an insufficient scale (in terms of number of participants or intensity of support) for a QED approach to be feasible.

Therefore, the emphasis of the impact evaluation will follow a Contribution Analysis approach, with a focus on:

• Intervention outcomes and impacts: What types of outcome and impact have the UKSPF funded interventions had, how have these been achieved and what has driven success.
• Strategic and behavioural change: What effect the pilot and demonstration projects for decarbonisation in the marine sector have had on the strategic outlook for delivery in South Hams. To what extent have the projects influenced engagement and practice further afield (across the UK and internationally)
• Future outcomes and impacts: What type of outcomes and impacts are the UKSPF interventions likely to lead to after the case study research is complete.
• Key lessons learned: What has worked well and less well in achieving outcomes in different contexts, geographies, and times.

Economic evaluation

It is proposed that the economic evaluation will follow the 4E鈥檚 approach set out by the National Audit office, considering economy, efficiency, effectiveness and equity of the programme investments. Where possible, this will incorporate cost effectiveness analysis drawing on the net additional impact analysis from the quasi-experimental design relating to the Research and Development theme.

Data to support the evaluation

The following data sources will be used across the three main strands of the impact evaluation:

Primary data collection

Research and Development	Decarbonisation
鈻� Stakeholder consultation (strategic and delivery) 鈻� Surveys of supported businesses 鈻� Surveys of non-supported businesses (if possible)	鈻� Stakeholder consultation (strategic and delivery) including research to test carbon savings

Secondary data sources

Research and Development	Decarbonisation
鈻� ONS data on innovation/ research and development 鈻� HMRC data on tax credits 鈻� Local programme data on R&D expenditure and collaborations	鈻� Emissions data from DESNZ 鈻� Local programme data on investment in decarbonisation activities