That meant they could be very good education of people in the industry, including growers, about what happened to the wool once off the farm.
“It’s all done very efficiently and you get your money in 11 days.
“The changeover in ownership is extremely smooth.
“And if it wasn’t for the auction system it would be hard to work out what value a farmer should put on their contract wool.”
Cameron is a wool exporter for SchneidersNZ and was the only woman among a dozen men on the buying bench at the wool auction held at the Canterbury A&P Show in Christchurch.
All wool auctions were open to people to go and watch but the show facilities made it easier.
She liked the idea of the open auction but said it was really no different to the ordinary fortnightly events.
“You’ve still got to make yourself heard.”
Bidding at the show auction was fast and spirited, just as it always was.
“It’s all market-led, what we’ve had here is not just a show, it’s normal,”
SchneidersNZ was part of a Swiss family-owned business operating in several parts of the world.
Cameron bought only at the fine-end of the wool market. The group had fine-wool manufacturing operations in Italy, Egypt, China and Argentina.
She bought wool at auction and on contract in NZ.
“We buy wherever we can get our wool and we’d buy more here if more was available.”
Australia, South America and South Africa also had the fine-wools the group wanted though there were overseas manufacturers of casual and sports apparel who insisted on NZ Merino wool because of the NZ story about the origin and the quality of the animal management.
With the NZ’s fine wool season nearly over, Merino wools were priced at their highest levels in a generation, topping the $20kg level on a greasy-basis, the amount returned to the farmer. That equates to a clean (scoured) price about the $30kg mark.
The prices were a supply and demand story, Cameron said.
“They’re getting up towards the top end for us and exporters have to work at making sure their clients have an understanding of the market.
“I’d say at the moment that prices are reasonably sustainable but they are at a point where they can be impacted by outside events that the industry has no control over.”
