A new market for selling wool will go live later this month.
Photo: Scott Leman
The Natural Fibre Exchange (NFX) will be an online means of buying and selling mainly heavier wool used for carpets and upholstery. It has been set up by Wools of New Zealand, sheep meat exporter Alliance Group, and online trading company CRA International.
Wools of New Zealand chief executive Rosstan Mazey said he hoped the market would appeal to people who bought wool in other ways.
"This platform is a natural evolution towards developing the most efficient means of selling significant volumes of wool," he said.
"Buyers in turn can compare all prices in real time with all parcels of wool available simultaneously over multiple rounds of bidding."
Online trading was playing an increasingly important role in international commodity markets, he said.
Wools of New Zealand sells 15 percent of the country's wool but Mr Mazey believed that could grow.
Alliance Group head of strategy at Nigel Jones said he recognised the importance of wool returns to its shareholders and was interested in exploring any opportunities NFX could create to improve the price transparency and returns to wool growers.
"We are a material seller of wool so we are excited about the potential benefits this technology offers to the co-operative including improving efficiencies and ease of doing business," Mr Jones said.
NFX will go live on 22 May.