The goat also brings cashmere, of which China is the world's largest producer.

"Cashmere must be the most luxurious gift that goats give to humans," said Zhang Lingli, 29, chief fashion designer for the St Edenweiss Cashmere Fashion Trading Co Ltd.

Cashmere is the fine, soft wool produced by goats and is specifically associated with one breed found in the Himalayas. In China it is sometimes dubbed "soft gold."

Cashmere feels much softer to the skin, and finer and warmer, than wool. It also outwears wool.

China is the largest cashmere producer in the world, thanks to its great, nutritious grasslands across Inner Mongolia and in the vast western hinterland which includes Gansu Province, Ningxia Hui and Xinjiang Uygur autonomous regions.

Many goat breeders have made their fortune in the past decade when the country's cashmere industry mushroomed as demand rose around the world.

"At the highest point, like in 2000, one kilo of cashmere sold for 530 yuan (US$63.85)," recalled Zhang. But now it has slumped to less than 100 yuan (US$12.04) per kilo.

Because of its value, wearing cashmere is regarded as a sign of wealth and high social status in much of Europe.

Cashmere products have a higher added value than garments made of other fibres.

Spotting the potential for profit, many livestock growers raised feral goats to produce cashmere down. It wasn't long before more than 2,000 cashmere factories had sprouted across China. It seemed everyone wanted a slice of the action, backed by a large supply of the raw material.

"Like securities in stock markets, the price of cashmere fluctuates," said Zhang.

Since late 1990s, cashmere prices fell dramatically because of unfair competition, a lack of co-ordination and poor management.

Indeed many goats were killed by depressed herdsmen unable to attain good prices.

Environmentalists in China weren't happy either. They complained that raising goats and shepherding them wild on the grassland was having a disastrous ecological impact.

"Goats are nature's best herbicide - they simply eat all the grass, even the roots, leaving the grassland as barren as deserts," said Zhang.

This very pressing environmental impact saw cashmere production dubbed a "sunset enterprise" as more people became aware of the damaging impact.

On the other hand, though, the cashmere industry has always employed many Chinese workers. It was economically difficult to simply suspend the industry and sack employees.

The St Edenweiss Cashmere Fashion Trading Co Ltd for example, one of the most profitable companies in the Chinese cashmere industry, employed nearly 10,000 staff in its branches in Shanghai, Shenzhen, Xi'an and its headquarter in the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.

Each year it sells 1.2 million pieces of cashmere, selling overseas, as well to native consumers in China. In Beijing alone it clears 10 million yuan (US$1.2 million) per year in the profit, according to Zhang.

Luckily in recent years, the government has taken steps to solve the dilemma between a promising revenue earner and environmental damage by instituting a new policy. "Returning the cultivated fields and returning the grasslands," is the new policy slogan. It advocates that herdsmen raise goats in folds and fences, rather than freeing them to run wild and eat everything.

This may offer a compromise between saving nature and satisfying human's desire for fluffy fashion.

In this year of the goat, the animals themselves may not feel quite as lucky as they did before.

"Goats tend to grow more cashmere down if they are free in the wild, especially in winter, for they are prone to endure the coldness with more layers of fleece," Zhang said.

"If they are kept in folds and fences, fed with hay and grain, their down production might reduce, for they won't feel that cold."

Whether that is the case remains to be seen. For now, a compromise has been struck to try and protect longer-term goals.

(Beijing Weekend January 31, 2003)