The Wisconsin Dairy Goat Initiative
A Public-Private Partnership to Reinvigorate Wisconsin’s Dairy Industry started in 2207 and running until 2012 the WDGI was collaboration of DBIC and WI goat farms. The overriding goal was to establish a statewide plan for information, education, and support of the industry. This included programming by UW-Extension, Research at UW, and curriculum by Wis Tech College System.
Discovery Sessions
During the summer of 2007, the Wisconsin Dairy Goat Initiative coordinated a series of discovery sessions around the state. Participants included producers, processors, extension agents, lenders, and representatives from the fields of rural development, marketing, specialty food retail, and agri-tourism.
The objective of these regional meetings was to identify existing resources that are available to support the emerging and growing dairy goat industry as well as to determine priorities for creating additional infrastructure.
A summary of these meetings and proposed next steps is available here: REPORT ON GOAT INDUSTRY DISCOVERY SESSIONS
Initial Research and Tasks
A meeting of dairy goat producers, processors, educators, lenders, and others held in February, 2006 produced a report on identified needs of the industry if the industry is to grow and flourish in Wisconsin.
This meeting marked the creation of the Wisconsin Dairy Goat Initiative’s Advisory Committee. See a list of Current Members here.Advisory Commitee members have actively participated in a wide range of events. For more information, please see: 2007 Participation of Dairy Goat Advisory Committee
The first Dairy Goat Initiative project was to study herd and financial information from 14 selected dairy goat farms. Though the 2004 Dairy Goat Cost of Production Study used a very small sample size and therefore cannot be considered to be conclusive data about the goat industry in WI, many of the findings of this study have since been confirmed by a larger study conducted by Wisconsin Agricultural Statistics Service.
Wisconsin Dairy Goat Industry Overview
In 2006, the Initiative funded a survey conducted by, surveying 165 dairy goat farms in the state. The results of that survey, Wisconsin Dairy Goat Industry Overview, can be found at www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/Wisconsin/Publications/Dairy/dairygoats.pdf.
These surveys helped establish Wisconsin information on herd numbers, production, prices paid for milk, how milk is utilized, costs of production, and future plans of producers.