The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) has announced two Dane County dairy companies among 15 across Wisconsin that will receive a Dairy Processor Grant. The purpose of these grants is to help foster innovation, improve profitability, and sustain the long-term viability of Wisconsin’s dairy processing facilities.
The 2023–25 budget signed by Gov. Evers provided an increase of $300,000 annually for the Dairy Processor Grant Program, providing a total of $500,000 for this year’s Dairy Processor Grant awards, with a maximum of $75,000 allowed for each project. Grant recipients are required to provide a match of at least 20% of their grant amount. DATCP received 36 grant requests totaling more than $2.2 million.
The Dairy Processor Grant recipients and their planned projects include:
- Middleton’s Foremost Farms USA to expand dairy processing employee training and development; and
- Sun Prairie’s Weyauwega Cheese LLC to hire and train specialized staff, and evaluate and enhance the sliced cheese production line.
Since 2014, DATCP has received a total of 235 Dairy Processor Grant proposals requesting a total of more than $9.2 million. DATCP has funded 121 of those proposals, totaling $2.5 million.
