How Much Do You Know About Cashmere?
Cashmere is sold as luxury.
Soft jumpers. Soft scarves. Soft branding. Soft lighting. Words like “natural”, “timeless”, “responsible” and “sustainable”. The goat is missing from the story.
Cashmere comes from the fine undercoat of goats. That undercoat exists to protect them from freezing mountain climates, not to fill human wardrobes. It is their insulation. Their protection. Their body. The fashion industry takes that protection, processes it, labels it luxury, and sells it back to humans as elegance.
There is nothing elegant about turning someone else’s winter coat into a status symbol.
What is cashmere?
Cashmere is a fine animal fibre taken from the soft undercoat of cashmere goats and other goat breeds. It is often used to make jumpers, scarves, cardigans, hats, gloves, socks, throws and bedding.
It is prized because it is light, warm and soft. That is the entire point. Cashmere goats grow this fine undercoat because they live in harsh climates where temperatures can fall far below freezing. Their coat is not a fabric. It is survival equipment.
It begins with goats.
Curious, social, communicative goats. Individuals who form bonds, avoid danger, feel fear, seek comfort, and do not exist to be converted into knitwear.
The industry calls their undercoat “fibre”. That is how exploitation works. First the animal disappears. Then the body part becomes a material. Then the material becomes a product.
Where does cashmere come from?
Most of the world’s cashmere comes from China and Mongolia, with other production in places including Tibet, Afghanistan, Iran, India, Turkey, Pakistan, Australia and New Zealand.
Some products are marketed as “Scottish cashmere”, but that usually refers to where the fibre is processed or manufactured, not where the goats were raised. The raw fibre often comes from Asia or the Middle East.
So the label may sound local, traditional and refined, while the goat behind it lived and died somewhere else entirely.
Cashmere has long been tied to status. Once reserved for the wealthy, it has become more common on the high street as demand has risen and production has intensified.
That is the usual story of animal exploitation.
A body part starts as luxury. Demand grows. Prices fall. More animals are bred. More land is used. More lives are reduced to production units. Then the industry starts inventing ethical labels because consumers begin to notice the blood under the branding.
How is cashmere taken from goats?
Cashmere is taken by combing, plucking or shearing.
Marketing prefers the word “combed” because it sounds gentle. Like brushing a companion animal on the sofa.
That is not what investigations have shown.
Goats can be tied by the legs, pinned down, stood on, forced onto their sides, or held by their horns while sharp metal combs are dragged through their coats. This can take a long time. Some sources describe the process as lasting up to an hour per goat.
The combs can scratch, cut and tear their skin. Investigations have documented goats screaming, bleeding, being left with wounds, and receiving no veterinary care or pain relief. Some footage has shown pieces of skin pulled away with the cashmere.
This is not “harvesting”.
This is not “brushing”.
This is taking.
Even when the process is less visibly brutal, the central injustice remains. Goats naturally shed their undercoat. The industry does not remove it because goats need humans to help them. The industry removes it because humans want to sell it.
Their bodies are treated as raw material. That is the issue.
Cashmere is stolen warmth
The most grotesque part of cashmere marketing is that the very thing humans admire is the thing goats need.
Cashmere is warm because it kept a goat warm.
Cashmere is soft because it grew close to a goat’s skin.
Cashmere is valuable because goats produce only a small amount of usable fibre each year.
Depending on the source, it can take the fibre from four, six or even more goats to make one jumper. A goat may produce only a few hundred grams of usable cashmere annually.
That scarcity is part of the price.
It should also be part of the moral calculation.
A jumper is not worth several animals being restrained, combed, exposed, bred, traded and eventually killed.
A scarf is not worth taking winter protection from someone who needed it more.
What happens after combing?
Cashmere does not end with fibre removal.
Goats used for cashmere are kept alive only while they are useful. Once their fibre quality drops, once they age, once they are ill, once their coat is the wrong colour, once they are no longer profitable, they are killed.
Animals used for fashion are not retired because they have given enough. They are not thanked. They are not allowed to live out their natural lives.
They are assets. When an asset stops producing, the industry extracts whatever value remains.
For cashmere goats, that often means slaughter.
Investigations in China and Mongolia have reported goats being dragged by one leg, hit over the head with hammers, having their throats cut in front of other goats, and continuing to move after their throats were cut. Their bodies may then be sold as cheap meat.
The industry sells the jumper as luxury and the goat as meat.
Two products. One victim.
Cashmere goats are not “just shorn”
A common excuse for cashmere is that goats are not killed for the fibre itself. This is the same excuse used for wool, dairy and eggs. It misses the point on purpose.
The issue is not only the final killing. The issue is the ownership. The breeding. The restraint. The taking. The mutilations. The exposure. The market value attached to a living being. The fact that their life is allowed to continue only while their body produces something humans can sell.
Goats in cashmere systems may also be subjected to mutilations such as castration, dehorning, disbudding, ear tagging or ear notching. Kid goats may be castrated without pain relief. Female goats are bred to keep the supply chain going.
There is no version of this that respects goats as individuals.
Cashmere is not a haircut.
Pregnant goats and kids are not spared
Some sources describe pregnant goats being subjected to the same restraint and combing or shearing as others. Being forced into position can be especially stressful and physically dangerous for both the mother and the unborn kid.
Young goats are also born into the industry already assigned a purpose. They are not born as someone. They are born as future fibre, future breeding stock, future meat, or waste.
Some young goats die from cold, hunger, harsh conditions, trampling or neglect. Others are killed because their coats are not profitable enough.
This is what happens when birth itself is commercialised.
The animal is not welcomed into the world. They are entered into a supply chain.
The myth of “ethical cashmere”
When consumers start asking questions, industries rarely stop exploiting animals.
They rebrand.
Cashmere is no different.
We now see terms like “responsible cashmere”, “sustainable cashmere”, “humane cashmere”, “certified cashmere” and “ethical cashmere”.
These labels exist to rescue the product, not the goat.
Some certification schemes may attempt to improve handling, grazing or traceability. Some may reduce certain risks. They do not remove the core injustice. The goat is still bred, managed, restrained, used, commodified and killed when no longer profitable.
Even some welfare-focused organisations admit that certification can only reduce welfare risks, not eliminate them.
Because the public is often sold certification as if it changes the moral status of the product. It does not. A certified goat is still a goat whose body is being used without consent.
A “responsible” supply chain is still a supply chain.
A “sustainable” slaughter industry is still a slaughter industry.
The question is not whether the comb was slightly less sharp. The question is why humans believe they are entitled to take the undercoat of a goat at all.
“But traditional herders depend on cashmere”
This argument deserves more honesty than the fashion industry usually gives it.
Many herding communities are economically tied to cashmere. Some have worked with goats for generations. Some live in regions where alternatives are limited. Many are not wealthy. Some are trapped in a market shaped by demand from richer countries, luxury brands and consumers who want softness without seeing the system behind it.
That does not make cashmere ethical. It means exploitation spreads. It affects goats first and most directly, but it also affects workers, herders, slaughterhouse employees, local communities, ecosystems and wildlife.
Rising demand can push herders to increase herd sizes. More goats means more grazing. More grazing means more land degradation. Degraded land produces poorer vegetation. Poorer vegetation can mean undernourished goats and lower-quality fibre. Lower-quality fibre means lower income. Lower income pushes herders to breed more goats.
That is not harmony with nature.
That is a debt cycle with hooves.
A just transition matters. People should not be abandoned. But keeping animals trapped in exploitation because humans are economically trapped too is not justice. It is one injustice being used to excuse another.
Cashmere and the environment
Cashmere is often marketed as natural, biodegradable and sustainable. Again, the branding hides the damage.
Goats are intense browsers. They eat large amounts of vegetation and often pull plants up by the roots, preventing regrowth. Their sharp hooves damage topsoil. When too many goats graze fragile land, the result is soil erosion, biodiversity loss, vegetation decline and desertification.
Mongolia’s grasslands have been heavily degraded, with multiple sources linking this to expanding goat and livestock populations, climate pressure and cashmere demand. Some reports say more than 70% of Mongolia’s grasslands are degraded or affected by desertification. The consequences include dust storms, air pollution, reduced carbon storage, loss of habitat and pressure on native species.
Cashmere production has also been linked to threats facing wild animals such as snow leopards, wild yaks, Bactrian camels and saiga antelope, whose habitats are affected by expanding commercial grazing.
Then there is methane. Goats are ruminants, and ruminants produce methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. The industry also involves processing, dyeing, transport, water use and chemical pollution.
So no, cashmere is not automatically sustainable because it comes from an animal.
“Natural” does not mean ethical.
A snake bite is natural. Arsenic is natural. A material can be natural and still come from exploitation, ecological damage and death.
Is second-hand cashmere okay?
Buying second-hand cashmere is not the same as buying new cashmere from a brand. It does not directly fund a new production order in the same way. But it still keeps animal-derived fashion desirable, visible and normalised.
If someone already owns cashmere, throwing it away does not help goats. But buying, styling and promoting cashmere still sends a message: this material is acceptable. This animal fibre is aspirational. This is what quality looks like.
Abolitionist fashion should not keep animal bodies in circulation as luxury symbols.
Wear plants. Wear recycled synthetics if needed. Wear second-hand non-animal materials. Wear anything that does not require pretending another being’s body belongs to us.
What about recycled cashmere?
Recycled cashmere may avoid some new production, but it does not make cashmere vegan.
It still treats goat hair as a luxury material. It still preserves demand, status and desirability around animal-derived fibre. It still keeps the idea alive that the best fabrics come from someone else’s body. Recycling can reduce waste. It cannot turn exploitation into respect.
What to wear instead of cashmere
There is no need to wear cashmere. There are already animal-free materials that can provide warmth, softness and comfort without using goats as fibre machines.
Options include:
🧵Organic cotton
🧵Hemp
🧵Linen
🧵Lyocell or Tencel
🧵Bamboo-derived materials from responsible suppliers
🧵Viscose from responsibly managed sources
🧵Soy-based “vegetable cashmere”
🧵Banana fibre
🧵Woocoa-style plant fibres
🧵Recycled acrylic
🧵Recycled polyester
🧵Other recycled or plant-based knitwear
No material is perfect. Fashion as a whole has serious issues with overproduction, waste, labour exploitation, pollution and greenwashing. But “nothing is perfect” is not an argument for using animals.
It is an argument for choosing better materials, buying less, buying carefully, repairing what we own, shopping second-hand where possible, and rejecting the idea that animals are fabric suppliers.
How to avoid cashmere
Check labels carefully. Cashmere may appear in pure garments or blends.
Also watch for:
▫️ Pashmina
▫️ Cashmere blend
▫️Wool blend
▫️Goat hair
▫️Animal hair
▫️Mohair
▫️Angora
▫️Alpaca
▫️Camel hair
▫️Qiviut
▫️Shearling
▫️Lambswool
▫️Merino wool
If a label says “natural fibre”, “luxury fibre”, “premium wool”, “responsible wool” or “sustainable wool”, check what that actually means.
Animal-derived materials are often hidden behind language designed to make exploitation sound tasteful.
What brands should do
Brands should stop using cashmere. Not improve it. Not certify it. Not trace it slightly better. Not create a softer story around it. Stop using it.
The future of fashion cannot be built on taking skin, hair, feathers, fur, wool, down, silk or undercoats from animals.
Fashion brands already know consumers are moving away from animal-derived materials. Brands have restricted or dropped certain animal fibres. Alternatives exist and innovation is moving fast. The only thing missing is moral courage.
What you can do
Do not buy cashmere.
Do not buy pashmina.
Do not buy wool, mohair, angora, alpaca, camel hair, shearling, down, silk, leather, suede or fur.
Check labels before buying knitwear, scarves, coats, bedding and soft furnishings.
Ask brands what their products are made from.
Support animal-free materials.
Choose fewer, better, longer-lasting items.
Repair clothing.
Buy second-hand animal-free clothing when possible.
Tell people what cashmere actually is.
Because most people are not choosing cashmere with full knowledge. They are choosing the story they were sold: soft, warm, natural, luxurious.
Tell the rest of the story.
Cashmere is not luxury
Luxury should not mean taking the warmth from a goat.
Luxury should not mean holding someone down with their legs tied together.
Luxury should not mean wounds without care.
Luxury should not mean babies castrated without pain relief.
Luxury should not mean mothers bred into production.
Luxury should not mean slaughter at a fraction of a natural lifespan.
Luxury should not mean grasslands destroyed, wildlife displaced, workers exploited and consumers lied to.
Cashmere is not luxury.
It is the undercoat of a goat who needed it.
It is a product of ownership.
It is an industry built on the idea that other animals exist as resources for human comfort, status and profit.
They do not.
Animals are not ours to wear.