Sheep welfare and flystrike prevention

Man and sheep have lived in a symbiotic relationship for 12,000 years. The sheep has provided man with food and clothing; man has provided sheep with nourishment and protection from disease, injury and predation.

Humane stewardship of sheep, allied with ecologically sensitive land management, is the key to ethically sound sheep production.
- Senate Select Committee report, Sheep Welfare

Protecting sheep from flystrike

Protecting sheep: It’s what we’re proud to do:

Free to graze in open farming systems, with plentiful food, water and shelter and careful attention to health and hygiene, Australian sheep are raised in accordance with the five freedoms, under some of the world’s most stringent welfare standards. Protecting sheep – keeping them safe from harm – is what sheep farming is all about. It’s what we’re proud to do.

Flystrike prevention: It’s our duty of care:

Flystrike is a serious disease that leads to severe suffering. It’s a very high risk for sheep in Australia and they have to be protected. This is achieved through best practice animal husbandry such as crutching and jetting with fly deterrent treatments. But sometimes this is not enough. Some sheep are more vulnerable and may require a surgical procedure called mulesing. This is highly effective in preventing flystrike. Performed when young, it provides sheep with lifelong protection. Science and experience tells us that without this procedure 1 to 3 million sheep would die from the disease each year.

We use best available welfare practices:

If a surgical procedure is required, it is performed by trained and accredited practitioners. Effective pain relief is used wherever possible, in line with RSPCA and Australian Veterinary Association recommendations.

We strive for constant welfare advances:

The Australian wool industry has an intensive R&D and breeding program to develop new treatments and anaesthetics and to breed sheep with improved natural resistance to flystrike. This is so that mulesing is no longer required. Although breeding will take time to be fully effective, more and more sheep are being successfully raised without mulesing every year.

Our commitment is enormous, and we provide regular updates on progress.

We pursue openness and transparency:

Growers use the best welfare flystrike prevention measures that are suited to their sheep type and environment. They are encouraged to use the National Wool Declaration (NWD) to identify their wool in the selling system as non-mulesed, ceased-mulesed or pain relief-treated. This provides transparency and choice in the marketplace.

In the NWD’s first year of operation, the Australian wool industry produced more than 18 million kgs of welfare-declared wools. This makes Australia the world’s largest supplier of non- and ceased-mulesed fine wools (<21 micron).

These volumes are expected to continue growing every year as breeding and other R&D programs progress.

Australian Wool Innovation

~ Assisting Australia’s woolgrowers to produce the world’s most beautiful wool through the most humane and ethical production systems ~

Established in 2001, Australian Wool Innovation is a not-for-profit company owned by over 29,000 wool levy payers who have registered as shareholders. The company is the Australian wool industry’s principal R&D and marketing body.

Australian Wool Innovation actively pursues R&D to deliver animal welfare advances. It encourages the adoption of best practice animal health and welfare, provides information and education, and reports on progress.

Australian Wool Innovation also assists global brand and retail buyers with marketplace and sourcing enquiries and reports on the availability of welfare-declared wools.

Australian Wool Innovation is proud to support, promote and defend the Australian wool industry’s high standards of ethical and humane care of sheep. We are here to provide assistance, advice and information.

Contacts

For more information or assistance please contact us.

R&D and breeding programs:
Australian Wool Innovation
welfare@wool.com

Wool volumes, sourcing and buying:
Australian Wool Innovation
research@wool.com

Australian Wool Exchange
http://www.awex.com.au
info@awex.com.au

Welfare laws and codes of practice:
Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry
http://www.daff.gov.au