Mulesing: a cruel dilemma

The Australian wool industry is set to once more come under fire for the controversial procedure known as mulesing. Animal rights activists are warning the industry that they are readying to relaunch their campaign against retailers who sell wool from mulesed sheep. "We're giving them until the 1st of January 2014," says the Animal Justice Party's Mark Pearson, "otherwise the campaign will be ramped up and reinvigorated."...

Global Luxury Goods Market to Cool in 2013, Says Bain & Company

PARIS, France - Growth in sales of luxury goods is expected to ease slightly this year, hit by subdued spending in Europe and slower growth in China, consultancy Bain & Co said in a study on Thursday. Bain, whose forecasts are closely watched by the industry, sees luxury goods growth cooling worldwide to 4 to 5 percent in 2013 from 5 percent last year at constant exchange rates...

Spoiler Alert: Eurovision 2013 Winner Announced

Emmelie de Forest has won the 2013 Eurovision Song Competition for Denmark with her song Only Teardrops. In a bizarre situation, the host of the event announced Denmark as the winner before the remaining votes from Cyprus and Croatia were counted. With Denmark 47 votes ahead of second place this didn't turn out to be a problem. 20-year-old De Forest was the bookies favourite leading into the final. Speaking on Danish Television, De Forest said "This is totally fantastic... I'm so happy"...

Getting the right people on the bus

New Zealand Merino Company CEO John Brakenridge discusses the role leadership and collaboration have has played in helping transform the traditional, production-led merino industry into a market-orientated culture that can deliver, create and capture value. My take on leadership is that it's about making things happen that don't happen naturally. In the New Zealand Merino industry, this has meant constantly challenging the status quo to flip a very traditional, production-led industry on its head and bring about a market-orientated culture that can deliver, create and capture value...

Zegna Discusses Mulesing

Prerecorded report by Sarina Locke about a fully funded tour of the superfine wool industry for 160 international journalists. Paolo Zegna, head of an Italian fashion house, speaks about the Zenga award winning word of the Hundy family. Interviewees: Paolo Zegna, head of an Italian fashion house; Andrew Hundy, Wool Grower...

AWGA slams welfare draft

HE draft Australian Animal Welfare Standards and Guidelines for sheep is outdated and unworkable and needs to go back to the drawing board, says the Australian Wool Growers Association (AWGA). A 60-day period for submissions on the draft to the federal governing body, Animal Health Australia (AHA), closed on Monday...

Yum says not affected by China mutton scandal

(Reuters) - Yum Brands Inc on Monday said its roughly 450 Little Sheep hot pot restaurants in China are not involved in a fake mutton scandal that is the latest tainted food saga to rock the country that is the fast-food chain's largest market. The comments from Yum came shortly after Shanghai authorities said they were testing mislabeled mutton from a wholesaler a government website said supplied Little Sheep and other restaurants. "There is no evidence, none whatsoever, of any adulterated product anywhere in our system," Yum spokesman Jonathan Blum told Reuters...

5 Marketing lessons from Lady Gaga

You may love Lady Gaga. You may hate her. But no matter what, it's hard not to respect what she's done as an artist. With 23 million albums sold, five Grammy Awards, and Forbes' distinction as one of the world's most powerful celebrities, at age 27, Lady Gaga is one of the most well-known pop artists in the world. Known as much for her voice as for her over-the-top wardrobe, few people recognize Lady Gaga for her business acumen...

Mulesing most effective

MULESING clips are eight times less effective at stopping breech flystrike in adult sheep as traditional mulesing. And younger sheep with clips applied were up to 30 times more likely to be flystruck than mulesed sheep. These are some of the results of a $400,000 Australian Wool Innovation-funded 3 1/2-year study comparing the effectiveness and cost of three treatments - mulesing, polypropylene breech clips and the long-acting insecticide Clik on unmulesed sheep...

Senator Barnaby Joyce- Political fiasco drawing to an end, but the pain will linger on

It feels like the political show is rolling the credits and the crowd is leaving the cinema on this Green-Labor- independent matinee. One evening this week, Tony Windsor flagged one evening his inclination for a same-sex marriage referendum; then, the next morning, he said he was not going to raise it with the Prime Minister, nor was he going to vote for it. This was followed by some incredulous babble about Facebook, social media and all in all translated to utter confusion...

Animal Australia launches new video

Sheep urgently need you to speak out this week. The Standards for how sheep can be treated in Australia are currently open for public consultation. This means you have a great opportunity to make your voice heard.
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