Three Premier League players have taken the unprecedented step of writing to leading figures at English football's three main governing bodies to urge them to make more funding available to support youth development schemes outside of the top four divisions.

Dave Kitson at Stoke City, Aston Villa's Curtis Davies and the West Ham United midfielder Jack Collison have sent letters to the Premier League chief executive, Richard Scudamore, the Football League chairman, Greg Clarke, and Sir Trevor Brooking, the director of football development at the Football Association, asking them to review their approach to youth development programmes run by full-time non-league clubs, the majority of whom receive no financial help and are struggling to make ends meet.

A little more than two weeks ago Jez George, Cambridge United's director of football, completed a 410-mile walk to raise £60,000 to keep the club's youth scheme going for another year. This week Mansfield Town have asked parents if they would be willing to pay for their children to attend their centre of excellence to prevent it from folding while Wrexham are consider selling their 10th youngster to a Premier League club in the space of 12 months to cover the running costs of their set-up. It paints a bleak picture of the realities of life in the Conference for former Football League clubs and funding is at the heart of the issue.

At present the 72 Football League clubs receive up to £180,000 a year from the Football League Trust towards youth development, with the FA and Premier League contributing £7.2m and £5.4m respectively. The two clubs relegated into the Blue Square Premier have their grant cut in half and if they fail to win promotion within two years the financial tap is turned off completely. At the same time they also lose the registration protection that prevents other clubs from poaching their best youngsters without paying compensation.

Kitson, Davies and Collison feel passionately about the subject because they have played for clubs affected by the current rules. Kitson and Collison spent several years with Cambridge United, who were relegated to the then Conference in 2005 but continue to run a centre of excellence, while Davies started his career with Luton Town, whose funding from the Football League Trust will end next year if they fail to win promotion.

In their letters, which have been seen by the Guardian, the three players ask the FA, the Football League and the Premier League to "review the current system and examine what can be done to improve it". They also write that they "appreciate there has to be point when the funding the FA and Premier League provide for youth development is cut off, but it seems unfair that at present this is determined by the division the first-team play in, rather than the quality of the youth scheme".

Kitson has gone as far as to say that he would like to meet with Scudamore, Clarke and Brooking to discuss the issue. "I would be more than happy to represent this side of the table," the striker told the Guardian. "I have got no axe to grind or anything personal to gain. I just think this is a real chance to do some good at a level of football which is often overlooked but has had tremendous success in bringing footballers through over a sustained period of time and to all levels of the footballing pyramid.

"We are not looking for an argument or any public recognition or 'look what I did'. We're looking at it from a point of view that this is where we came from and that the funding problems may have escaped attention of the wider football world. This is a chance to show that we keep English football in order at all levels. No one tier is more important than any other. Yes, one tier may produce more money than the others put together but football is not more important to the community of Manchester than it is to the community in Cambridge."

A decade ago youth funding in the Conference would not have been an issue but an increase in the number of full-time clubs at that level has raised standards. Although this has yet to be recognised in terms of securing funding, sources at the Football League, FA and Premier League insist that the subject is on the agenda as the three bodies move towards introducing an Independent Standards Organisation for the start of the 2011-12 season that would externally verify the quality of all youth set-ups.

The potential problem, however, would not be whether a number of Blue Square Premier clubs meet the criteria laid down but where the additional monies might come from. George, who last month launched the Protect Football's Future campaign together with five other former Football League clubs to raise awareness of their plight, has a couple of solutions. "My argument is that either Football League clubs need to get a bit less so that some clubs in the Conference that qualify for the funding can get something or are we really saying that there is not half a million pounds spare in the Premier League coffers to spread between six to eight clubs?"

Read the letter to Richard Scudamore from Dave Kitson, Curtis Davies and Jack Collison