WHETHER it was thought up by Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig or the Government, "social licence" is on the farming agenda.
Senator Ludwig referred to a social licence when questioned last week in the Senate as to why his ban on live exports to Indonesia included exports from a "closed-loop" exporter - that is, someone who owned the cattle, the Indonesian feedlot and the Indonesian abattoir.
His response was: "Farmers who produce food and fibre had to have a 'social licence' from the general public."
Senator Ludwig said a social licence was equal to community trust.
And for the closed-loop exporters to be able to resume exports, they would have to demonstrate to him that they had the following four things in place:
TRANSPARENCY in their supply chain.
TRACEABILITY system for their cattle.
A SUPPLY chain assurance scheme in place.
INDEPENDENT third-party auditing of its supply chain assurance scheme.
AWEX director and WoolProducers president Don Hamblin said: "Is that not what we in the wool industry have in place with the AWEX National Wool Declaration Integrity Program?"
But while the declaration, which defines and audits the mulesing status of clips, ticks all of Senator Ludwig's needs, it was in danger of collapsing because of a shortage of funding and an indifference among many in the wool industry who believe the integrity program should be funded on a user-pays basis.
While wool exports were unlikely to be caught in the turmoil that has embroiled live cattle exports to Indonesia, there is a public perception issue - that is, the welfare of the sheep.
C&C would suggest a minor contribution by Australian Wool Innovation from its marketing funds to the integrity program would be a good marketing investment in Senator Ludwig's social licence for wool.
The M word
MULESING is one word Australian Wool Innovation would like to remove from its lexicon.
In its latest National Research, Development and Extension strategy paper, any reference to the welfare issue of mulesing is addressed by the goal of "reducing, replacing or refining the use of invasive husbandry procedures", while at the same time setting a goal to align "animal welfare practices with consumer and community expectations".
