Wool Equities puts hand in for WSI deal

Photo / APN

The fight over the future of the wool scouring industry has encountered a new twist.

Wool Equities chairman Cliff Heath yesterday said the company had secured funding to enable it to put in an offer for scouring operation Wool Services International (WSI) on behalf of wool growers.

He said Wool Equities was close to announcing details of how growers could take an ownership stake in the opportunity.

On Friday, the High Court temporarily stayed the sale of WSI to Cavalier until there was an outcome to a challenge transtasman carpet-maker Godfrey Hirst had made to a Commerce Commission approval of the deal.

Godfrey Hirst general manager Tania Pauling said her company was relieved that WSI's business could not, ahead of an appeal, be dismantled by Cavalier as it sought to extract monopolistic benefits.

Godfrey Hirst mounted its appeal against an approval given a month ago for the creation of a monopoly in the nation's wool scouring.

Heath yesterday said farmers should own critical wool assets such as WSI, and Wool Equities was doing all it could to help that happen.

- NZPA