Cashmere wool is originally named after an old spelling of the Kashmir region in India, where the fiber was first used centuries ago. After goats were imported to the plains and grasslands of Mongolia, nomadic herders soon found that their geographical location resulted in some of the world’s highest quality cashmere wool. Encompassing a vast swath of land in the northern region of China and Mongolia, surviving the harsh and extreme climate of the Gobi Desert is no small feat. Surrounding the cold, dry desert is the Eastern Gobi Desert Steppe, which is a broad ecotone (a transitional area between two ecosystems) that extends from Inner Mongolia in China north to the vast grasslands and plains of southern Mongolia, with an average elevation of 1,800 meters above sea level. It is here that many of Mongolia’s nomadic herders have lived and tended to their livestock for centuries.