Dust off old research

He says it should instead tap into past research reports lying on shelves and use these to produce technically superior yarns that could become commercially successful.

Heath told the NZ Primary Industry Summit that the wool industry has 2500 documents of past research, funded by farmers through wool levies and the Government; these are held by research organisations, WRONZ, Canesis and AgResearch.

“The past research, almost without exception, has never been commercialised,” he says. “There was an acute waste of funding in the past; we need to pull some of the documents and see if we can use them.”

Heath says the need is to produce unique yarns and take them to garment makers throughout the world.  “There are garment makers out there who are looking for a competitive edge; if we can present them a right yarn that works for them then we have a real future.”

Heath believes there is a need for a small onshore processing facility, similar to Icebreaker, the successful Merino wool clothing company.

“Just as Icebreaker established onshore and was effectively globalised offshore, we need to do this again and again and again.”