The Australian clip today
Demand for our wool is heavily influenced by market forces and international fashion trends.
AUSTRALIA’S WOOL production now accounts for about 20–25 per cent of global supply. However, our sheep numbers were in steady decline until recently. The Australian flock crashed to a 100-year low of 68 million sheep in 2009, following years of poor wool prices that culminated in a huge wool stockpile and the scrapping of the reserve price scheme.
However, a rise in global demand, and consequently prices, has seen Australia’s wool production lift in the past year. The Australian Wool Production Forecasting Committee predicts shorn wool production will grow by 1.4 per cent in 2017–18 on the previous year, to 345 million kilograms, and the national flock is also expected to rise to about 76.6 million this year.
Sales from Michell Wool, one of Australia’s largest wool processors, to clients all over the world were up 10 per cent for the period from July to October last year. The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES) predicts the value of wool exports from Australia could rise by up to 20 per cent in 2017–18 to $4.3 billion.
Although many superfine woolgrowers have direct sales contracts with their customers, the bulk of wool produced by Australia’s 35,000 woolgrowers is still sold at auction. Some 70–75 per cent of that wool is bound for processing in China, and either exported to other countries from there or used by its burgeoning and increasingly affluent population.
“People use this objective clip testing to differentiate and prepare their wool clip,” Ian says. “It’s very accurate, and an even greater tool when used in combination with body weight, ASBVs and visual classing.
“Most of my work is for commercial woolgrowers and in merino studs. In some f locks it has helped to increase f leece production by 1–1.5kg per sheep, which is a lot more wool if you have 5000 sheep, and especially worth doing if a premium is being paid for f iner wools.”
Greg says the dohne breed, favoured equally for its meat and wool, is well suited to his country. “We got into dohnes because they don’t require as much mulesing as the merinos; it was a marketing decision,” he says.
“The labour saving is also important and they’re a tough breed. We sell 350 merino and 250 dohne rams a year and rarely need to drench or feed our sheep. Buyers know that the animals that come from Hamilton Run will survive the toughest conditions because they are born in pastoral country we lease north of Orroroo. We still mules our merinos, because we have so much clover burr, but we’d eventually like to stop.”
FOR ALL THE CURRENT optimism in the Australian wool industry, mulesing remains the elephant in the shearing shed. This long-held practice of cutting skin from a sheep’s backside, which signif icantly reduces the possibility of f lystrike, has come under increasing scrutiny from animal activists and consumers in recent years. Wool brokers are reporting growing demand for non-mulesed wool from mills moving to satisfy discerning markets, and it can command a premium in the auction room.
“The sustainability of the farmer, care of the environment, and their animal welfare and labour practices are increasingly important to buyers of wool in northern and western Europe, Japan and the USA,” says executive director of Michell Wool, David Michell, whose family have bought, processed and traded wool since 1870 (see page 79).
Public pressure has seen growing numbers of wool producers either cease mulesing or give sheep pain relief before and after the procedure. Many have turned to genetics for answers and some have developed private certification schemes to underline their animal husbandry.
“It’s a natural fibre and there’s a feeling with sheep that you are working with nature.”
Fifth-generation Flinders woolgrower Jim Kuerschner and his wife Gaye, on Mitchylie at Black Rock, south of Orroroo, stopped mulesing their merino sheep in 2007. They buy their rams from a stud that doesn’t mules and are actively selecting and breeding sheep to eliminate any future need to mules.
“We went to a plainer-bodied, easier-care sheep,” Jim says. “We get rid of any sheep that gets f ly-blown on this place because research has shown that susceptibility to f lystrike is hereditary. With just 2500–3000 sheep, it’s easier for us to manage our sheep this way than producers in the pastoral country, who might only see their sheep two or three times a year. We didn’t stop mulesing because it was bad for the welfare of the animal, but because consumer ignorance about animal welfare on farms will mean that mulesing may eventually have to be phased out.”
A former shearer, Jim is the eldest of nine siblings, three of whom grow wool. “I don’t know what the breeding value is for that,” he says, laughing, but he’s clearly proud to see his granddaughter Sophie now taking her f irst steps around the property. As well as their merinos – which produce about 90 bales of wool a year – the family enterprise includes fat lambs, cattle and cropping across 2630ha. Jim and Gaye’s sons, Tom and Sam, need to derive additional, off-farm income, but today they’re in the yards drafting lambs on land their ancestors f irst took up in 1874.
“Sheep are a very important part of our operation; it’s a natural f ibre and there’s a feeling with sheep that you are working with nature, not against it,” Jim says. “Even if you have a really bad year and lose a lot of money on failed crops, you will never lose money on sheep.”
THE PACE IS FRENETIC in the shearing shed at Toolangi, a property in Hallett, south-east of Jamestown. Amid the buzz of handpieces and the blaring radio, four shearers perform their awkward yet well-practised routines. Fleeces f ly and hooves clatter on timber.
“Disorganised harmony is what I call it,” says wool classer Jack Napper. For about 20 years he’s been a member of Daryl Growden’s contract shearing team, and today’s line-up is a closeknit group more like family than workmates.
Wool prices are certainly a cut above what they’ve been for decades.
“Team harmony is very important,” says Daryl, who has been shearing for 35 years. “We spend more time with each other than with our wives. Some weeks we’re together seven days just to keep up. But you get to visit different places and see how other people live. Shearing is a great foundation for life; it’s a hard job and it takes its toll on your body, but you soon learn to value a dollar.”
His son Beau was not an enthusiastic convert at f irst. “I was encouraged to work in the sheds with Dad as a kid and I hated it,” the 20-year-old says. “Then it grew on me and now I love it. You have freedom and can work at your own pace. Every shed is different, and if you work hard, the results show.” How many others his age in rural Australia already own their own home, as he does?
Although many aspects of the Australian wool industry have changed during the past two centuries, shearing is not one of them. It still requires the same skilled labour force it ever did and efforts to modernise wool-harvesting – from sheep cradles to robotic shearers – are yet to bear fruit.
But at Toolangi, the installation of a raised circular shearing board improves the workf low for Daryl and his crew. And, unlike the older generation of shearers, youngsters Shane Chase and Beau regularly benef it from expert tuition at shearing schools. “I learnt to get the f leeces off with brute force,” says Daryl, belying the elegance and economy of his blows (single cuts) and daily tally of 180–200 sheep. “But now Beau teaches me a thing or two. He reckons he will make a shearer out of me one day.” And every blow and centimetre of wool cut counts.
It’s too early to describe it as a boom, but wool prices are certainly a cut above what they’ve been for decades. At Toolangi, owners of the Mount Razorback Pastoral Company, Brad and Tessa Tiver, are enjoying seeing the soft, creamy f leeces come off the boards. “I just love growing wool,” Brad says. “You are always trying to improve it, and every year is different. That’s what keeps you going, through good years and bad.”
As the good times roll, woolgrowers in the Flinders Ranges are investing in gleaming new sheep yards and long-awaited improvements to their shearing sheds, even looking to expand. “It’s the best it’s ever been,” reports Geoff Power. “With prices holding firm, we can actually start to budget, and you definitely sleep better.”
From Test cricket jumpers to underwear, shoes, outdoor wear and even the distinctive striped apparel of Venetian gondoliers, wool is being used today in all sorts of new and traditional products. If the growers of the Flinders have their way, it will be used in many more.
They have a great ally in wool processor David Michell, who is now producing woollen garments of his own. “I can’t help myself,” he says. “It’s a renewable product that is warm and yet can breathe, is f ire-resistant and soft to handle. People still don’t understand how good wool is. It’s a matter of getting it out there and on their backs.”