(UPDATE 7-6-2023) The ISU Extension webinar on raw milk has been canceled.
The new law allowing the sale of raw milk went into effect on July 1st, but it is unclear how much of the unpasteurized product will be sold here.
Iowa State University Extension Dairy Specialist, Fred Hall, says they’ve been getting questions since the law passed. “What we’re hearing from are the questions that are coming from the folks who are currently milking one or two cows. Maybe they would fit in the homesteader category if you had to pigeonhole them,” Hall says. Milk sold in Iowa was required to be pasteurized to kill harmful bacteria before the new law.
Hall says it’s unlikely large-scale dairy producers will sell raw milk because it can’t be delivered to stores for resale. “That’s one of the provisions in the legislation, that it has to be sold directly to the consumer. There’s not, you know, any milk truck gonna pick it up and, bring it to a central market,” he says. “In fact, they cannot take milk to a farmers market or central market or the Casey’s.”
ISU will present a webinar on raw milk in conjunction with the Iowa State Dairy Association on July 12th from 6 to 9 p.m. Hall says they will have an expert on the webinar who can answer some of the questions. “Mark McAfee is the owner and operator of the largest raw milk dairy in the country. He’s in California,” Hall says. “And we’re asked him, just tell us how you did do this? You know, give us some of the guidelines. So folks don’t have the same pitfalls that maybe you experienced early on.”
They will also have an expert on handling the milk. “How do you process it so you make sure that you’re keeping the integrity of that product safe when you bottle it when you hand it off,” he says. Hall says those who are thinking of running a raw milk dairy would have to be in a community that is large enough to have a viable market. “I would say 70-thousand people in a metropolitan area or the town probably is a good start,” Hall says. “The other side of that is if you are in the community, and you have lots of family, and you have five or six family members who want to buy milk from me, that’s another niche that I think is very workable.”
