SMALL and micro-businesses in Cumbria will soon be able to apply for a share in a £cash pot - to boost trade and create jobs.

A new grant scheme has been announced which will allow applicants to bid for a pot of European cash awarded to Cumbria.

Cumbria County Council is the accountable body for the £7.3 million pot and it will be divided across two geographical areas.

These are the Solway, Border and Eden area (SBE) and the Cumbria Fells and Dales area (CFD).

The Cumbria footprint area is described as corresponding to both the Lake District National Park boundaries and part of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, as well as the remainder of South Lakeland including Kendal, upper Eden and Penrith and the Millom peninsula. The Solway area covers a large swathe of north Cumbria including west Cumbria and Solway coast, parts of the Eden Valley extending to the Northern Pennines and including businesses in a number of 'key market towns' like Kirkby Stephen and Appleby.

The hope is for 255 jobs to be created across the two areas with support to nearly 400 businesses in total.

The money is coming from the LEADER programme, which is a way of distributing European Rural Development Programme (RDP) funding. The overall RDP budget allocated to the programme nationally for 2014 to 2020 is £138m.

Cumbria has England’s two largest LEADER programmes and between 2009-2013, 2013 they delivered over £15m of investment into the county's rural economy - supporting 700 businesses creating over 300 new jobs and 14,000 training places.

The new grant awards will be decided and dispensed via a Local Action Group which is being set up in December.

Cllr Nick Cotton, chairman of the South Lakeland Local Committee, has been chosen as the Cumbria Fells and Dales representative on the Local Action Group.

The money in the Cumbria Fells and Dales area will go on three objectives which include investing in small and microbusinesses to create growth, jobs and opportunities for expansion between 2015 and 2020. Another objective is to invest in farming, with an emphasis on hill farming, forestry with particular emphasis on woodland management and wood-fuel and tourism to encourage new visitors and visitor experiences. Money will be available for eligible farm businesses, rural tourism, forestry businessess, small enterprise and farm diversification as well as cultural and heritage activity, that meet the criteria.

In a discussion on the new funding, Cllr Stan Collins for the Lib Dems, cautioned against more money for tourism businesses.

He said: "We should be looking at diversifying the economy - not increasing our dependence on one sector. We need tourism but we need it to be balanced by other industries as well. Our tourism industry is dependent on a lot of things and any disruption to those it will hard times very quickly."