Natural Fibre Connect 2025: Beyond sustainability - mobilizing finance to restore global rangelands through sustainable livestock fibre value chains

From 22nd to 26th September 2025, more than 160 delegates from 27 countries came together in Edinburgh for Natural Fibre Connect (NFC) 2025 with over 1,000 participating virtually. NFC is an alliance between leading alpaca, cashmere, mohair and wool organizations and the event is a global platform that brings together different value chain stakeholders such as producers, policymakers, researchers and fashion brands committed to shaping a regenerative future for the natural fibre sector. The discussions moved beyond sustainability as an aspiration focusing instead on how investment, science and collaboration can accelerate transformation across rangelands and value chains.

A highlight of the conference was the session “Collaboration for Rangelands: Fashion for Land with the RSC,” hosted by the Rangeland Stewardship Council (RSC) and featuring the Sustainable Fibre Alliance (SFA), The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the Global Alliance for the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists (IYRP) and the Sustainable Investments for Large-Scale Rangeland Restoration (STELARR) project, which was represented by Fiona Flintan, a Senior Scientist at International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and STELARR project lead. This session brought together voices from different stakeholders to explore how rangeland restoration could be realized through the cooperation of fashion policy and science. The dialogue focused on identifying what works in practice and how to replicate those solutions.

Xenya Scanlon, Chief of Communications, External Relations and Partnerships at UNCCD, stated that the land is an important stakeholder for fibre value chains but is often overlooked. She added that governments cannot solve land degradation alone and the private sector is part of both the challenge and the solution. From the producer perspective, the CEO of SFA Una Jones shared lessons from Mongolia, where rangeland stewardship has become central to national sustainability strategies. She noted that approximately one third of Mongolia’s population depends on livestock herding and when rangelands are healthy, so are livelihoods. Therefore, restoration is not just an environmental goal but an economic imperative.

Financing restoration: The blended approach and monitoring

A presentation on blended finance was led by ILRI’s Lennart Hientz, Global Livestock Investment Specialist and part of STELARR project, who highlighted practical pathways for attracting private investment into rangeland restoration.

Blended finance allows to reduce risk, lower the cost of capital and scale investment into rangeland restoration project explained Hientz. By combining public, philanthropic and private capital, land restoration investment can become more profitable while delivering measurable climate and biodiversity benefits. The presentation also covered monitoring and why it is important. Investors increasingly demand credible science-backed data to measure the impact of land restoration projects. A robust monitoring system is not a reporting burden but could act as an investment enabler. His message reflects the growing consensus at NFC 2025 that data, environmental performance and financial returns should advance together to keep and make natural fibre industries more competitive.

Lasting impact through healthy rangelands

Throughout NFC 2025, participants repeatedly emphasized that natural livestock fibre value chains can directly contribute to global environmental and development targets if well-managed, benefiting not only producers but also protection of carbon in soil and vegetation and biodiversity.

Co-organizer Willy Gallia from The Schneider Group noted in his closing remarks, that the time has come to move beyond annual meetings and translate collaboration into concrete action and projects. Initiatives such as STELARR and the RSC work already on putting these suggestions into practice and support stakeholders to enable and facilitate land restoration investments.

As momentum builds toward the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists 2026, NFC 2025 highlights that a commitment to sustainable livestock fibre value chains goes hand-in-hand with commitment to sustainable rangelands.

Acknowledgement

Funded by the Global Environment Facility, STELARR is being implemented by IUCN and executed by ILRI in partnership with the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, International Center for Agricultural Research for Dry Areas (ICARDA), Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry Centre Forestry Research (CIFOR-ICRAF), the Secretariat of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), and the Sustainable Fibre Alliance. Additional research support is provided by the CGIAR Science Program on Multifunctional Landscapes. ILRI thanks all its donors including those that contribute to the CGIAR Trust Fund.