Italian and Swiss companies are illegally pedalling the wool whilst Governments in the rest of Europe try to stamp out the trade.

Shahtoosh, which means “king of wool” in Tibetan, is so fine, light and translucent that a shawl made from it will pass through a wedding ring. Napoleon gave one to Josephine. Indian Maharajas gave them to their concubines and Chinese emperors sent armies to plunder them.

Now shahtoosh is the latest thing to hit Europe’s fashion scene and few seem to know or care where it comes from. Even customs officers wave through consignments of shahtoosh oblivious to its illicit nature.

James Sugden, managing director of Johnstons of Elgin, Britain’s oldest cashmere importer, says: “Shahtoosh is on everybody’s lips at the moment. It’s coming into vogue because it’s the rarest of the rare.”

“The luxury consumer wants something that’s caressing and is beautiful to the touch. In the ultra-high fashion world, which designs for the stars and for princesses, it’s coming back in a big way.”

High in the mountains of Ladakh on the border between Tibet and India lie the most lucrative hunting grounds for the shahtoosh poachers. Armed with automatic weapons and mounted in four-wheel drive vehicles, the poachers butcher the chiru. The young Does, standing less than a metre high and desperate to protect their young, are no match for the poachers’ machine guns.

The poachers sweep along each valley shooting all that comes within range. Those that escape the bullets are caught in vicious leghold traps. The animals may remain trapped in agony for days before a hunter arrives to despatch them.

Dr George Schaller, of the New York based Wildlife Conservation Society, has spent more than a decade studying the antelope. He has seen whole herds of dead chiru stacked up in poaching camps. The camps, he says, “are deeply depressing places”.

“But far worse than the carnage of the camps is the horror of seeing a beautiful animal killed so that a rich woman can wear a shawl around her neck. That’s the most depressing thing of all. It’s needless killing.”

Dr Schaller explains that the high valleys and plains of the Himalayas once contained hundreds of thousands of the rare chiru antelope.

At the turn of the century the British explorer Captain C G Rawling recorded in his diary: “Almost from my feet away to the north and east, as far as the eye could reach, were thousands of doe antelope with their young.

“We could see in the extreme distance a continuous stream of fresh herds steadily approaching; there could not have been less than 15,000 to 20,000 visible at any one time.”

Now the herds of thousands have been reduced to scattered remnants of five or six. If the poaching carries on even these will be wiped out within a decade. The fashion industry, no doubt, will move on to another rare fabric or animal skin.

Once the antelope are killed, a hundred grammes of wool is removed from their soft fleecy stomachs. Occasionally the horns are taken and used in medicines. The rest of the body has no value. 

In the high passes and plains of India, Tibet, Nepal and China, Shahtoosh is the currency of poaching. It’s used to pay for tiger bones, drugs and guns. Tigers are poached in northern India. Their bones - used in Chinese medicines - are smuggled into Tibet, Nepal and China. The tiger poachers are paid in shahtoosh and guns. They prefer shahtoosh. It’s light, easy to carry, but more importantly, easy to hide.

This two way trade is fuelling tiger poaching and funding Kashmiri guerrillas fighting for independence from India. India’s tiger population of 3,000 is being reduced by one animal every day. Tigers could be virtually extinct in India within a decade.

Belinda Wright of the Wildlife Protection Society of India says: “It will be impossible to save the tiger if the shahtoosh trade is not brought to a halt. Every shahtoosh shawl has the blood of a tiger on it.”Shahtoosh is generally smuggled into India inside consignments of sheep wool or even inside petrol tanks, sleeping bags or down jackets. Sometimes it is carried across by heavily armed gangs of bandits. Nomadic herdsmen mounted on yaks occasionally carry across small quantities of the wool as they have done for centuries.

But it is organised middlemen and smugglers who make the most money and who are really driving the trade. Whereas the nomads may smuggle a hundred grammes of shahtoosh at a time the armed gangs carry across many kilos in weight. When the shahtoosh is smuggled into India it has a street value of about £1,000 a kilo. Trafficking tiger bones one way and shahtoosh the other earns the smugglers profit margins of 600 per cent or more.

When the wool is made into shawls the profits are even greater. They are sold in Indian boutiques for £300 each. Weight for weight they are far more valuable than cocaine or gold. By the time they reach the West they are worth from £2,000 to £10,000.

In one recent raid, London’s Metropolitan Police seized 138 shawls worth over £350,000. It was the largest haul ever made anywhere in the world. The police are now trying to unravel the international network responsible for smuggling the shawls into Britain.

Andy Fisher, of the Metropolitan Police’s Wildlife Crime Unit, fears that this seizure of shawls won’t be the last. He sees it as part of an attempt to create a demand for the shawls in Britain and Europe.

“And once the demand is there somebody’s going to supply it,” he says.

It is not just Europeans that are trying to stamp out the trade. China - where most of the animals are killed – is doing its best too. All European governments and China have signed CITES - a treaty that bans the trade in endangered species. But banning a trade and enforcing it are two entirely different matters. The vast wilderness areas where the antelope live and the high value of their wool ensure that the poaching continues.

Recently the Chinese authorities had a rare success. They seized wool from 486 animals in Qinghai Province in the south west of the country. India has also signed CITES and in principle gives the chiru the highest level of protection. In practice, however, shahtoosh shawls are freely available in private and Government owned shops across India.

Belinda Wright, of India’s Wildlife Protection Society, says: “The Indian Government doesn’t seem to have any inclination to stop the trade. It’s just stalemate.”

Poverty, ignorance of the law and corruption allow the trade to continue but the real driving forces are rich consumers in the developed world.

“You just have to look at who’s buying the shawls,” says Dr Schaller.

“They’re the ones driving the market. It’s the rich people in wealthy countries who are siphoning away these creatures from the Himalayas. It’s disgusting.”

Whilst many wealthy European countries are following Britain’s lead in trying to stamp out the illegal trade, Italy and Switzerland, for example, hardly acknowledge there’s a problem.

Dr Schaller says: “One of Italy’s main wool dealers has been handling shahtoosh for years. I can’t name the company for legal reasons but the people in the trade know who it is.”

Police and reputable wool dealers warn that if enforcement is not tightened up then the trade will continue to flourish. At present, the “king of wool” is still depressingly easy to buy. There are plenty of willing consumers too.

Trevor Pickett, who runs a leather and wool boutique in Chelsea, says: “We have dealers trying to supply us with shahtoosh and customers asking for it. We could easily buy and sell it if we wanted to but we won’t touch it.

“You really do have to question the morality of a person who wants to have an animal killed just so they can have a pretty shawl around their neck. In many ways it’s more cruel than fur.”

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Comments (5) >>

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written by Dana Orlandi, October 23, 2007

eager to join and do what is necessaary to keep the movememt in the public eye

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written by Dana Orlandi, October 23, 2007

what do you need me to from my home here in Laguna Woods, Califoria? I am eager to help.

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written by Lorraine Kim, September 25, 2007

The sad thing is, even when people know that the animal has to be killed to harvest the fibre, they don't care. How anyone can justify owning such a thing is morally irreprehensible and is indicative of their hideous and despicable character. My former boss smuggled one from India, and yet she proclaims herself to be a compassionate human being. Our society is so hypocritical; don't believe what people try to portray themselves as. What they show you is usually a lie and glosses the insecurities they have inside.

I too wish there could be a campaign launched to aware and embarrass the so called educated and elite Shahtoosh lovers. It's okay to want nice things, and luxury isn't bad, but having it at the expense of an innocent creature should make you revile it. Regardless of fashion, luxury and desire.

Lorraine Kim
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written by Terry Hollister, July 27, 2007

How is it Chiru cannot be raised and the wool sheared as with sheep or cashmere goats?

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written by Sandeep Datta, July 03, 2007

I wish people could visualise antelopes as their own kids in captivity or getting hunted for their skin. The news related to antelopes' dead bodies could have held a more significant meaning to all Shahtoosh lovers. And, much before wearing those Shahtoosh shawls (entelopes'skins), they could have shed a tear for their plight.

I wish there could be a major campaign launched to aware adn embarrasss the so called educated and elite Shahtoosh lovers in public.

Sandeep Datta
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