A cheesemaker in Quebec’s Outaouais region has picked up public funding for the equipment to make cheeses from ewes’ milk, and to bring its products to market.
Fromagerie Les Folies Bergeres, which officially opened Friday at Saint-Sixte, about 50 km northeast of Gatineau, will get $100,000 in non-repayable funding through Canada Economic Development’s Community Diversification program.
The funds allowed the business to buy the necessary cheese-making equipment and cover, among others, the costs involved in bringing its products to market, the government said in a release.
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“Getting the farm properly installed required a total investment of nearly $230,000, leading to the creation of four jobs in the short term.”
“Fromagerie Les Folies Bergeres’s project reinforces the efforts of local stakeholders to make Outaouais producers aware of the commercial development potential offered by secondary and tertiary agri-food processing,” local MP and foreign affairs minister Lawrence Cannon said in the release.
The farm, operated by an ex-military husband and wife duo, produces 25,000 to 30,000 litres of ewes’ milk per year, along with slaughter lambs.
The cheese plant is to specialize in the making and marketing of cheeses made from pasteurized ewes’ and cows’ milk, including cheddar (blocks and bagged curds), feta, cream cheese and others.
The farm sells its products from an on-farm shop and in delicatessens and “well-known” restaurants in the region, including several in Ottawa and Gatineau.
