This week on the Head Shepherd podcast we have Monica Ebert.

Monica has been involved with sheep her entire life. She grew up on a stud farm in North East Kansas, USA breeding and showing British Downs Breeds. 

The passion for wool came a little later after Monica studied Fashion Design and Marketing at University. This is where she started to see the link between fashion and fibre. She decided she wanted to focus on wool as it goes into apparel. Monica interned in Texas at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research centre. 

Monica returned to Texas AgriLife Research to complete her masters degree focusing on wool supply chains. There she focused on a genetic study crossing Australian Merino genetics to try and fine up the Rambouillet (Merino) in the US. 

From there she went to Montana State University to manage the Wool Research Lab for a year, focusing on working with local wool growers in the state of Montana. 

Mark and Monica worked together at the NZ Merino company and both left at similar times. Mark to start neXtgen Agri and Monica to South Africa. Monica is working for South Africa's (SA) biggest wool broker, BKB, managing a brand named Core Merino. Monica has been there for the past four years and she's been focusing on the environmental impact on fibre growing and what that means globally to both the producer and the consumer. 

Core merino is a wool athleisure brand started in 2012. Monica came on board in 2018 and gave the whole brand a revamp. 

"South Africa is a beautiful country, people enjoy being outdoors and being active"
The perfect market for a merino athleisure brand but at the time they were only marketing it towards farmers. Monica increased the Core Merino online presence and the orders started adding up.

Monica also gives Mark a run down of the farming systems in SA. Sheep are a massive part of the economy but as are crops and Angora goats- with South Africa having the largest agoria goat population in the world. 

“The farmers here are incredibly resilient.” It’s not an easy place to farm with the weather, natural predators and animal health issues like Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) disrupting supply chains. With no first stage processing in SA, and Chinese borders closed to South African raw wool due to a FMD outbreak, it is getting increasingly harder for wool brokers to shift wool. 

This is the second time in the four years that Monica has lived in SA that a FMD outbreak has resulted in China closing their borders.
“It has made the industry wake up and realise maybe we’re too reliant on others. They are now looking at what they can do, but it won’t be an overnight fix. "We could fine-up the wool and target the European market or process wool ourselves.” Monica says.
After four years in SA, Monica is now back off to the US. She’ll be working with the Woolmark company in North America working with multiple active outdoor brands.

“I think we can see the need to collaborate as a wider industry to make sure consumers know that wool is the clean green fibre it is”.

Monica has been championing wool her entir

Head Shepherd is brought to you by neXtgen Agri International Limited. We help livestock farmers get the most out of the genetics they farm with. Get in touch with us if you would like to hear more about how we can help you do what you do best: [email protected].

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