Cashmere quality of Raeini goats kept by nomads in Iran

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Abstract

The income of the nomads in Kerman Province depends mainly on Raeini goats that produce meat, milk and cashmere. This paper assesses the cashmere quality and its variation in Raeini herds to determine the scope for improvement. In April 2010 fleece weights (FW) and midside fleece samples were taken from a total of 686 male and female cashmere goats of 1, 2 and 3 years of age belonging to 29 herds. The herds were randomly chosen in the summer grazing area of nomads within 20 km of the city of Baft, province of Kerman, South of Iran, the main cashmere producing area in Iran. Cashmere yield (CY) was determined from the weight of dehaired cashmere to weight of shorn fiber. Cashmere fibers were analyzed using an OFDA instrument. A general mixed linear model including sex, age and sex by age interaction as fixed effects and herd as random effect was used to analyze the data and measure the relationships between different cashmere characteristics and fleece attributes. The overall means ± standard deviations were for fleece weights (FW) 507 ± 183 g, cashmere yield (CY) 56.5 ± 12.2%, mean fiber diameter (MFD) 19.7 ± 1.5 μm, fiber diameter standard deviation (FDSD) 4.5 ± 0.6 μm, fiber curvature (FC) 62.9 ± 8.5°/mm and staple length (SL) 54.2 ± 7.0 mm, respectively. Herd effect was significant for all traits except for SL and sex by age effect was only significant for MFD. One year old males and females had finer cashmere than older goats. FW and FDSD were higher in males and CY and FC was higher in young animals. Pearson correlation between MFD and FC, FDSD and MFD, MFD and FW was −0.647, 0.399 and 0.211 respectively. Raeini cashmere is white, has an excellent SL and FC but is relatively coarse. Given the differences between and within herds there seems to be substantial scope to improve the commercial value of Raeini cashmere.

Introduction

Of the 25 million goats in Iran 40% are kept by nomads in a habitat of about 59% of the total area of the country (Ministry of Agriculture, 2004). Goats are mainly kept for selling live animals to local markets, and for home consumption of meat but cashmere is also a major source of income for Raeini, Nadushan, Birjandi, Abadeh and Abasabadi goat breed keepers (Ansari-Renani et al., 2011). Iran together with Afghanistan is the third largest producer and exporter of cashmere in the world, after China and Mongolia (FAO, 2009). More than 50% of the Iranian cashmere is produced by Raeini goats in Kerman province.

Dehaired cashmere is one of the finest and softest luxury natural fibers of the world used mainly for clothing providing warmth and lightness (Watkins and Buxton, 1992). The world demand for cashmere represents less than 0.01% of the international textile market but it is growing, for both fine and coarse cashmere, the latter due to the introduction of cashmere blend garments in the market. Processors pay according to origin, color and length of cashmere. Origin refers to Chinese, Mongolian or Afghan/Iranian and is usually associated to differences in fiber diameter (Schneider, 2011). Iranian cashmere is generally designated as 2–3 μm coarser than Chinese and Mongolian cashmere (Petrie, 1995) and is therefore cheaper (Phan and Wortmann, 2000, Schneider, 2011). Ansari-Renani (2001) showed that cashmere produced by three different Iranian breeds, Raeini, Nadoushan and Birjandi, was indeed coarser but also longer than cashmere from China and Mongolia. This finding was confirmed by McGregor and Postle (2004) and McGregor (2007). They tested cashmere from different origins of the world, including 18 samples from Iran and found that the Iranian cashmere was coarser, longer and had more crimp than cashmere from Australia, China and Afghanistan. Beyond that, little additional information on Iranian cashmere characteristics is available.

This paper studies cashmere quality and its variation in Raeini herds in the main cashmere producing region in Iran in order to determine the scope for improvement, in particular of fineness which would increase the market price and thereby the income of the nomad producers depending on the income from their goat herds.

Section snippets

Cashmere production system in the study area

Raeini goats are kept by nomads (Ashayer) that graze their herds in Kerman province in spring and summer and migrate to the southern Persian Gulf provinces of Hormozgan and Bushehr in autumn. The study was conducted in Kerman province, SE of Teheran, near the city of Baft (29°17′N 56°36′E). The area covers 12,030 km2 and is the main cashmere goat production region in Iran. Altitude is about 2270 masl and annual precipitation varies from 180 to 320 mm. The climate in spring and summer is hot and

Results and discussion

Table 1 shows the overall means, standard deviations and ranges for the six traits considered across all sampled animals. These values include the between and within herd variation. Some of the extreme values probably correspond to Raeini looking crossbred animals. For example animals with less than 20% cashmere yield or less than 200 g fleece weight are probably meat goat crosses. In this case some of the variation may be due to different management, shearing dates, genetic quality, or other

Development options for cashmere production and conclusion

Raeini cashmere can be characterized as long and highly curved however steps must be taken to improve fiber diameter to capture higher prices in the international markets. Significant differences were found between goats and between herds indicating the potential to improve cashmere quality and the need for adopting proper management and selection methods. This may be achieved through selection of goats with finer cashmere taking care of maintaining the excellent cashmere staple length and

Acknowledgments

Our nomad guide Hamid Mousapour has been extremely helpful in the logistics and implementation of the field work. We are thankful for support of International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) for funding this research study. Our gratitude is extended to Iranian Animal Science Research Institute and Agriculture and Natural Resources Center of Kerman province and ICARDA office in Tehran for the support of this project. We are also thankful for the technicians of Alrun Fiber Laboratory in

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