Why Wool Matters
Janine Sterland discovers the story behind The Campaign for Wool’s inspirational new film featuring the Prince of Wales
WOOL HAS been one of the most widely used natural fibres across the world for thousands of years, thanks to its versatility, availability and unique characteristics.
Because it has environmentally friendly properties which encourage a circular cycle in returning to the earth through a natural process of biodegrading, the popularity of wool, many would assume, would be at a premium. However, as The Campaign for Wool’s new documentary film highlights, the harsh reality over time has been an overall decline in the use of many natural fibres including wool. Since the development and widescale use of manmade fibres such as petroleum-derived polyester, 69% of the world’s fibre production now comprises of synthetic oil-based materials, and only 1% is wool, according to The Campaign’s research.
Encouragingly, though, as this film explains, a movement is gaining pace to promote the use of wool as an integral component for improving the future of our planet. This is due to a growing cultural concern in the likelihood of global irreversible climate change, combined with evidence from scientific research into the damaging environmental effects of man-made fibres (such as landfill and plastic entering waterways as microfibres from the result of synthetic wash cycles), Within The Campaign for Wool’s Why
Wool Matters video release, His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, as patron of The Campaign for Wool, describes the urgency and importance in choosing wool, with an emphasis on the benefit it can bring to the environment. “It is abundantly clear to me that we need to make changes to the way we think about the production, use and the disposal of clothing and textiles if we are going to get anywhere near to meeting the United Nations climate change goals set for the industry,” he says. “A major part of that change has to be moving from a linear system to a circular one, where textiles and clothing are produced sustainably, enjoy long use, and are made using natural materials, specifically wool, which will biodegrade naturally and quickly at the end of their useful life.” SUSTAINABLY SOURCED FASHION
Amy Powney, Creative Director of luxury ladieswear brand Mother of Pearl, is also featured within the documentary. She describes her admiration for the passion and commitment from HRH The Prince of Wales in advocating the value of wool. “HRH has tirelessly communicated the benefits of wool as a natural, biodegradable and renewable fibre by highlighting wool’s many attributes and properties to
consumers, including wool’s reduced impact on the planet and its marine life,” Amy says.
The use of natural, ethically produced fibres including wool is central to Amy’s business. “Sustainability has been a lifelong passion of mine, and I’ve been on a mission for Mother of Pearl to reduce its impact on the planet, in all areas, for the past 15 years,” she explains. “There was no handbook on how to achieve this, but I wanted to know from start to finish where our products were grown or derived, who was making them, and the social impacts. I had to journey to find the best factories, visit the farmers in their fields, and really get to know and transform every aspect of my supply chain.”
Alongside the transparency of each contributor to her business, Amy strives to reduce, reuse and recycle all the fibres that her brand uses, as well as incorporating sustainable natural fibres within Mother of Pearl collections – including wool. “Natural fibres such as wool are a renewable resource that can be easily recycled once they reach the end of their life; they decompose in the earth, returning to nature much more easily than synthetic man-made fibres. Wool is a staple fibre in our collection,” she reports.
Mother of Pearl’s luxury coat collection, for example, uses wool from Burel - a company which sources its fibre from Serra da Estrela Natural Park in Portugal. “Wool is part of the culture and history of this region,” says Amy. “The company has a strong belief that sustainability starts with wool and the sheep that have shaped the valleys within the area.”
In support of the message of Why Wool
Matters, Amy’s belief in sustainable living is reflected within her brand ethos. “In essence, we should all source our produce, energy and clothing from as many renewable and regenerative methods as possible, and ensure that nothing is wasted,” she says.
“I’m an avid believer in sustainability being a mind-set - almost like a filter you put all your decision-making through, looking into all the options and not always choosing the easiest route. Ultimately, everything that is produced comes with a cost and a carbon footprint; everything we do and consume requires energy in some way and has an impact - there is not a straightforward solution to carbon neutrality, and people are always going to want to buy things. However, it is about making smart choices and buying from brands which take into account people, nature and the planet and aim to work in harmony with all of them.”
ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH
Within the documentary, this viewpoint is shared by Dr Henry Greathead, a lecturer in Animal Production Science/Zoology within the School of Biology at the University of Leeds. “People are increasingly looking to buy from and support businesses that make concerted efforts towards environmental stewardship,” he says. “We should be buying sustainably produced products such as wool, which may well cost more, but this can be offset by buying less - buy less for more, not more for less!”
Henry also feels that wool should be recognised for its proven warmth and well-being attributes: “Wool is a natural thermoregulator - wearing wool is an experience, one I suspect many people may not have had or have forgotten”.
As a ruminant nutritionist, Henry’s teaching relates to ruminant animals such as cattle and sheep, as well as farming production systems such as outdoors versus indoors and grass-fed versus grain-fed. “Interestingly, ruminant animals are excellent at converting high fibre feeds of low nutritional value, for example grass, into foods of high nutritional value such as milk and meat - and of course into fibres such as wool,” he explains.
Unfortunately, he says, “wool is an annual, mostly undervalued, product from sheep produced extensively off pastures in arguably the most ‘natural’ of systems of production”. Henry describes how a greater use of wool in textiles would reduce the demand for synthetic fibres. “An increased demand would provide sheep farmers with an additional valuable source of income. In addition, there is very little input of fossil fuels in the production of wool from sheep. And wool does not accumulate in the environment; it is biodegradable and easily recyclable. The same cannot be said for synthetic fibres that are made from fossil fuels and are mostly non-biodegradable.”
Henry also explains how scientific research is investigating the carbon output in wool production - and so far, there have been encouraging findings. “Wool production, unlike synthetic fibres, sequesters carbon in the form of the feed, principally grass, fed to sheep. The amount of carbon, carbon-equivalents in the form of methane, produced from ruminant animals in the production of products like wool, is the subject of a great deal of research, as is the sequestration of carbon by pastures and the soils in which they grow - we can and are driving down the carbon footprint of wool.”
REGENERATIVE WOOL FARMING
Lake Hawea Station, a ‘carbon positive’ farm situated in New Zealand, east of the Southern Alps and on the edge of Lake Hawea, is featured in Why Wool Matters, and supports this research. Since owning the 200-year-old farm for four years (comprising of 6,500 hectares, 10,000 Merino sheep and 200 Angus cattle), owner Geoff Ross has campaigned for regenerative agriculture and carbon positive farming.
“The biggest challenge of our time is most simply the climate crisis; it’s in fact the biggest challenge of recorded history,” Geoff asserts. From his experience, he has found that “within farming today, you need a massive broad skill set; we’ve always had to be mechanics, vets, accountants, agronomists, but now more than ever you actually have to be an environmentalist.” Through research into the farm’s sequestration, which compared the carbon its vegetation and farmland absorbs in comparison to its carbon output, results show that Lake Hawea Station is carbon positive. “This means we are sequestering (absorbing) more carbon than we are emitting into the atmosphere, therefore we are carbon positive – this is even better than being carbon neutral.” Geoff describes how Lake Hawea Station is aiming to be ten times positive by 2025; it will plant more native trees, and is adopting practices to restore beech forest and freshwater ecosystems. “We believe regenerative pastures are overall better than mono crops for the soil, animal health and environment.”
As well as carbon positive agriculture, Lake Hawea Station’s farming practices aim to protect endangered plant and animal species. “This includes the cypress hebe and olearia fimbreata tree daisy, as well as clutha flathead galaxiid fish and western grand skink lizards,” Geoff explains. As described in the Why Wool
Matters documentary, Geoff feels that “a common myth in farming is that it is at the expense of the environment - we came here with a real interest in improving environmental value, so that has allowed us to share this information and get an exchange going with a whole lot of other farmers, because farming and the environment can actually be built constructively together.”