(Des Moines)– A northwest Iowa dairy operation is among 11 awarded funding through the Choose Iowa Dairy Innovation Grant program. Vellema Dairy of Harris was awarded $75,500 to assist with the installation of a double-seven parabone-style milking parlor. The project has a total cost of $182,849.
The Choose Iowa Dairy Innovation Grant Program offers competitive matching grants of up to $100,000 per project, with a one-to-one financial match required, to support on-farm dairy processing and labor-saving technologies. Eligible projects include investments in processing and packaging equipment, robotics, automated feeding systems, herd health monitoring technology, and other value-added innovations.
The 11 projects will receive a total of $614,620.35 in cost-share funding and leverage more than $1.27 million in total investment.
Iowa Ag Secretary Mike Naig says the Choose Iowa Dairy program helps farmers improve efficiency, expand processing capacity, and bring more Iowa-made dairy products to market.
The announcement was made in conjunction with June being Dairy Month.
