Scouring needs ‘rationalised’

Press, 6 September 1989, Page 7

Scouring needs ‘rationalised’

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

in Wellington

Rationalisation is needed in the wool-scour-ing industry, says the Minister of Agriculture, Mr Moyle.

He told the fiftieth annual conference of the Wool Scourers’ Association in Wellington that this was inevitable after the 8 per cent decline in wool production for 198990 estimated by the Wool Board. With 12 plants in the North Island and 13 in the South, and further improvements in scouring technology, rationalisation was needed.

The East Coast drought had taken a heavy toll of wool production in both Islands, with sheep numbers down 9.5 per cent in Gisborne-Hawke’s Bay

and down 8.5 per cent in Marlborough-Canterbury. Mr Moyle said that if normal weather conditions returned then the reduction in stocking rates and the consequent better feeding ought to see an improvement in livestock performance and better wool weights. One of the worst traps that farmers had got into a few years ago, encouraged by the policies of the day, had been to “put too many feet on the ground.”

Fewer sheep better finished would be a sounder prospect in the long-term, he said.

He shared the Wool Board’s confidence that prices for New Zealand wools would hold up this season and that demand

would balance against the availability of that wool.

The intention of the Wool Board to engage in further commercial activities, in view of its role as the industry’s regulatory body, was a logical step. It was part of an evolving process in the marketing of wool in keeping with the modern technology of wool appraisal and sampling, packaging and presentation, Mr Moyle said. The Wool Board was charged with the general objective of obtaining, in the interest of growers, the best possible longterm returns for New Zealand wool and this extension of its commercial activities was in keeping with that.