After years of neglect we at last have a government paying attention to wool's plight.

The manner in which the previous government dumped the last of the stockpile brought a huge supply shock to the trade in 2003.

Ever since that time traders have had no security of supply.

Therefore they reduced their investment in promotion.

The recent capitulation to PETA has come because there is not enough wool to make it worth the trouble for those retailers to fight PETA.

It is the profit ethic, not any animal ethics, which is driving these "boycotts".

Too little throughput = too little profit.

Australia’s once profitable Agriculture and Livestock production economic sector was regarded by our past Federal Government’s as industries of National Significance. Today sadly, they rarely rate a mention at the political level aided in their thinking by many political commentators and advisers, whom strongly believe that Australia can do without Farmers simply by importing all domestic needs based on purist economic rationalism. The Australian economic purist has demanded and received from the Australian farmer, produce to be placed into the hands of the consumer at or, below the cost of production, not realising that farmers have no control over cost inputs or any mechanism by which to pass them on. With the onset of global food shortages achieved through, what can only be termed as “starvation politics”, many countries have moved to enhance the protection of their domestic farmers and in some cases closed off exports of some produce to secure internal food and fibre demands. PETA, through the Australia wool industry, has exposed severe inadequacies in the purist economic theory and further, exposed Australia’s very poor political system of unrepresentative “Peak Industry Councils” and Industry Corporations. Simply, PETA has been three political steps in front of AWI and Woolproducers Australia from the very outset. It is therefore gratifying to see that our national Minister for Agriculture, Tony Burke, is putting some political competence into the mulesing fiasco on behalf of the Australian wool grower.

A letter is excellent to state the governments' view in black and white. But it is only a start.

There is need for personal visits to the key users of Australian wool, along with presentations showing the graphic details of flystrike.

It is pertinent for such a visit to ask those key users to ask PETA about the recent visit to Austalia by one of their vice-presidents to Australia -- and especially how many sheep stations he visited to inspect mulesing and flystrike at first hand.

Or did he not visit any, and if not -- why not ??

PETA's campaign has to be appreciated!

Wool growers must see that they follow the basic animal welfare standards, if they fail, more and more companies across the globe will boycott Australian wool.

Mulesing was discussed much here in Scandinavian countries this spring, since it came as a big surprise to the public that such a cruel method is being used as a standard procedure in Australian wool industry.

Most people who saw the document (which led to Hennes & Mauritz's decision not to buy mulesed wool) will remember the shocking images of mulesing at the moment of buying a product made of merino wool.

Might be that Australians have become "immune" to the cruelness of the mulesing, but looked from outside it is absolutely brutal and unacceptable. Comparable to scalping, as one Swedish journalist wrote.

It is disappointing that a modern country such as Australia keeps using such a brutal method, since decades. Luckily the end to it comes in two years, but alternatives should have been developed long ago.

I am also very disappointed at the Australian government's position to live export of animals for slaughter. What should be shipped to Middle East is meat, not live animals for days. Shame on you.

It's fair enough that PETA and their supporters are standing up for their beliefs on this issue, but I would like to ask - If they are so passionate about helping the animals, why are they not working WITH the Australian wool industry to find an ethical and effective alternative to mulesing?

All I can see that PETA is doing is harassing the agricultural and fashion industries and while that may lead to more pressure being put on woolgrowers and the government, it ultimately isn't helping the solution come about any quicker.

If anything it is hindering the process by taking up the finances, resources and time of the people who are working towards a solution.

The Australian agricultural industry is already under enough strain with the drought that is still ravaging the country. Why doesn't PETA assist the wool industry to reach a solution by working with them insead of against them?

It's all good and well to say that alternatives should have been developed long ago, but did you know that the research and development of an alternative to mulesing has been going on since 2004? clearly it is not as easy as all you people think.

With limited funds and resources how quickly and effectively do you really think they'll get. So instead of getting on your high horse and saying how terrible Australian woolgrowers are, why don't you all look a little bit deeper into the issue, see both sides of the story and get off woolgrowers backs and onto PETA's to help do something about it!!

I'm not supporting the act of mulesing but I am supporting the wool industry's efforts to rectify the situation - what are you doing?

Thank you for your cooperation. Animals are like us with pain and pleasure. Thank you very much.