Australian Wool Innovation acting CEO John Roberts said the organisation had put its "heart and soul" into trying to get as many people trained as possible to deal with the crisis.

"We've had our novice and improver courses really ramped up over the last three years, a priority will be to ramp that up even more," he said.

"We've got to look at not just training shearers here in Australia but there are a lot of discussions going on about the Pacific Islander worker program and if there's some success there, we will certainly look at training those people as well.

"We're going to look at every angle possible because we can't just depend on those New Zealand shearers, even in times when we don't have a pandemic."

"We're to have another 200 novice shearers trained and on the stands by the end of the year, but that's not enough, we've got to do more."

AWI also introduced toolkits for learner shearers last year as an extra incentive to build up their skills.

Shearing Contractors Association of Australia's Shearer Woolhandler Training executive officer Glenn Haynes said training courses in Victoria and South Australia were booked through until March with waiting lists in place.

"For 2022 alone we started 102 learners in full time employment in Victoria and South Australia," he said.

"The main problem we have is the farmers all want to shear at the same time in the spring.

"Contractors will give the farmers preferences that have the best set ups and pay quickly and present their sheep well."

In 2018 there were about 50 people who attended SCAA shearing courses in Victoria, with that number tripling in 2021 to 156, with 57 going into full-time shearing employment and 35 going into wool handling.