Federal agriculture minister Lawrence MacAulay announced Feb. 4 that Ottawa is investing an additional $1.75 million in Canada’s dairy research cluster.
The investment is aimed at boosting milk production and improving the industry’s knowledge about the health effects of dairy fat.
The research is also expected to enable Dairy Farmers of Canada to take better advantage of Agriculture Canada research.
The new investment, furnished under the Growing Forward 2 agricultural framework, brings total investment under the dairy research cluster to $13.75 million.
The dairy research cluster was launched in 2013 and brings together scientific expertise in key areas such as sustainable milk production, dairy genetics and genomics, and the nutrition of milk products.
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It provides support for a Canadian dairy industry that generates more than $6 billion in farmgate sales each year, $15.4 billion in processing sector sales and supports more than 112,000 jobs, said a news release announcing the funding.
This new investment will support research in two specific areas:
– Enhancing the energy of forage crops to maximize milk production.
– Studying the impact of dairy fat products such as cheese on cardio-vascular health in humans.
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