Mulesing: Wool growers urge to confront controversy and spell out benefits
More needs to be done to show consumers why mulesing must continue in some environments, or the national wool industry will suffer, a lobby leader says.
EIGHTY per cent of Australia’s wool clip is sold as mulesed wool as growers continue to use the practice to prevent flystrike, and the leader of the sector’s lobby group wants a marketing push to explain why to customers.
And unless the industry can explain to customers why mulesing — teamed with pain relief — must continue in some environments, it risked “losing its reputational capital”.
Wool Producers of Australia president Ed Storey said continuation of mulesing may see that wool penalised on price.
But, he argued, more should be done to show consumers why, on many properties, it was in the sheep’s best interests to mules.
While many wool growers selectively breed bare breech sheep that do not require mulesing, use flystrike-preventive chemicals or shear more frequently to tackle blowfly strike, industry data shows less than 20 per cent of growers now produce non-mulesed wool.
“It is a difficult, complicated discussion but one we need to have if we are going to get wool back on the footing it should be – marketed as the most sustainable, biodegradable, environmentally-friendly fibre,” Mr Storey said.
WPA is pushing for national mandating of pain relief at mulesing, “and then, when that is achieved, and when growers declare it on their National Vendor Declarations, we may have a hope of prosecuting the case for why some areas may need to continue mulesing”, he said.
Mr Storey criticised Australian Wool Innovation for its “mixed messages” and failure to provide clear market intelligence to wool growers about mulesing and to “sell the health messages of mulesing”.
“Exporters tell us it is a key issue; the Australian industry collectively needs to address it and growers need to know the truth about the impact,” Mr Storey said.
AWI’s messaging “ambiguity” risked causing the “reputational capital of the Australian wool industry to continue to decline, when we know that it should not”.
Mr Storey called on the industry to decisively address mulesing in its 2030 strategy, due for release in November.
AWI chief executive Stuart McCullough said AWI had communicated to growers that some fashion labels preferred non-mulesed wool, but that AWI’s focus was on research and development and marketing, meaning it took an “agnostic” view and respected wool growers decisions to mules or not.
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NSW wool growers Carina and Andrew Doran successfully phase out mulesing
Mulesing status in the National Wool Declaration remains unchanged