2nd Generation Support & Maintenance - Market Sounding

Rural Payments Agency (RPA) is an Executive Agency of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). It is the single paying agency responsible for Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) schemes in England and certain other schemes throughout the UK.

Managing change is at the heart of successful policy delivery. It requires the implementation of ever evolving policies through services that must achieve economic, environmental and social outcomes while being efficient and cost effective. These challenges must be overcome with the minimum disruption to customers and service standards.

The CAP is a framework of agricultural policies that are agreed by the European Union (EU) every seven years. The implementation of these schemes and programmes falls to each administration within the UK. The UK Government (as with all Member States and Devolved Regions) is subject to substantial disallowance penalties if the EU Commission auditors consider that key and ancillary controls are not in place or if they disagree with the local interpretation of the rules.

The CAP Delivery Programme was set up in 2012 by Defra to design and implement the service that will enable Defra to deliver CAP.

The overall CAP solution consists of a technical solution, a set of supporting services including Service Management and infrastructure. The 1st generation contracts for the design and implementation of IT systems that support the development CAP schemes are due to expire at the end of September 2016. Replacements will be required to ensure continuity of services.

The 2nd Generation Procurement (2GP) project has been initiated to define scope and procure new contracts which will be predominantly for the support, maintenance and hosting of applications with limited development capability going forward.

Suppliers should read the attached document carefully to gain a thorough understanding of our CAP Systems support requirement.

Additional information: Disclaimer

This document is provided solely for the purposes of obtaining feedback from interested organisations on the future provision of Rural Payment services. It does not commit Defra to any procurement scenarios outlined in this document or any subsequent decisions based on the output of the market sounding exercise. This document summarises certain aspects of a potential commercial exercise but does not purport to contain complete descriptions of such potential arrangements. Any services described in this document are proposals only and should not be taken as final. The recipient of this document should note that the information contained is preliminary in nature and is subject to amendment. No decision has been made as to the form of any commercial exercise and as with all public funded work, it is subject to approval. Accordingly, no reliance should be placed on any information contained in this document and no representation or warranty expressed or implied is being or will be made and no responsibility or liability is being or will be accepted by Defra, its agencies or any of its advisers as to the accuracy, adequacy or completeness of such information within this document (save where prescribed by law). This document is not intended to form the basis of any investment decision or evaluation by the recipient and does not constitute and should not be considered as a recommendation by any person in connection with Defra, its agencies or CAP Delivery Programme. Each party to whom this document is made available should, at its own cost, make an independent assessment of the opportunity set out in this document after making such investigation, as it may deem necessary.