Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to page seven of her Department's policy brief, How increased Connectivity is Boosting Prospects of Rural Areas, published in December 2014, what assessment she has made of the effect of the Skills and Knowledge Transfer Programme on business people in rural areas to date.

To date, the Rural Development Programme Skills and Knowledge Transfer Programme has provided training across England for 215,000 (non-unique) participants who have completed 220,000 training days. Delivery is still underway and an evaluation will be carried out.