The England Golf Partnership (EGP) has welcomed a £13 million grant from Sport England to continue to develop the sport over the four years from 2013-17.

The grant is an increase on the £12.5 million core funding award for the current period and will support programmes to encourage more people to start and stay in golf and to nurture talented players.

Roger Moreland, the EGP’s Chief Operating Officer, said: “We are very pleased with this level of financial support from Sport England and look forward to working with them to maximise their investment and to build on our successes of the past four years.”

The grant is part an investment of almost half a billion pounds in grassroots sport, announced by Sport England. It is intended to keep the inspiration of London 2012 alive and help fulfil Lord Coe’s pledge that the Games would get more people playing sport, a feat that no other host nation has ever managed to achieve.

The 2013-17 Whole Sport Plan for golf, which will be rolled out from April, includes plans to encourage more people with a disability to take up golf and focuses on providing opportunities for people older than 26 to take up the game and play more often. In addition, the plan contains proposals for increasing the number of young people aged 14-25 playing the game.