Exporters will match dollar for growers’ dollar

“Wool” is the brand and we all need to pay to get it there. Creating demand for wool needs money. The industry has to work collectively and fund the programmes jointly.

Exporters are offering to match grower money dollar for dollar so that growers’ don’t have to shoulder the costs on their own. Similar funding offers from exporters have been rejected in the past, but this time it is essential for survival of the industry that growers take up this offer. “Put the money in the hands of an all industry promotions company and let it decide the best way to build consumer preference for wool,” exporter Peter Crone says. “Anyone with good promotion or marketing ideas should be helped the same way as operates in other export sectors.

“There is a lot of creativity out there. People are thinking about ways to open up new markets, create new products or find niche areas that will give wool an edge over synthetics,” Mr Crone says.

“The key to good spending is that when a dollar of grower’s money is risked, there’s a dollar of private enterprise money sitting alongside it.

“At the moment we’ve got a system Meat & Wool NZ is trying to launch through Wool Partners International that’s exclusive and cuts out 90 percent of the industry. What we need is an inclusive way to capture Kiwi ingenuity.”

Mr Crone said he was particularly keen to see growers or groups of growers participating and promoting the attributes of wool or wool blends for textiles and carpets under the umbrella of the Woolmark.

Wool exporters have been highly active in a wide range of activities that often go unnoticed by the farming industry and we highlight some of them in this publication.