A Christmas sweater story spun from sheep data

If you came here looking for detailed Christmas sweater data, you are out of luck. We do, however, have more than enough sweater-related data to spin a fact-based yarn about this recent holiday tradition.

Wool sales at an all-time low

The Canadian wool industry was hit hard by COVID-19 and the associated supply chain issues during the first two years of the pandemic.

Wool merchants bought 883,200 kilograms of wool from Canadian farmers in 2021. This was the lowest volume bought since data collection began in 1996 and was down by almost half from the record high 1.6 million tonnes purchased in 2004.

Wool merchants spent $707,000 on Canadian raw wool in 2021, paying 76 cents per kilogram, up from 69 cents a year earlier but half that spent in 2015 ($1.54).

To put this into a festive perspective, Canadian wool merchants bought enough raw wool in 2021 to make 974,000 Christmas sweaters. In 2004, they bought enough wool to make 1.7 million Christmas sweaters.

A “lambie” boom this spring

Canada was home to 1.6 million sheep and lambs during the first six months of 2023, up 1.4% from a year earlier and the highest number of sheep and lambs counted over this period in a decade.

There was a bit of a “lambie” boom in Canada during the first half of 2023, with 673,700 lambs born, the highest number of births since 2006. By way of comparison, an estimated 357,903 children were born in Canada from July 1, 2022, to July 1, 2023.

It should be noted that, while a small share of these lambs will go on to produce wool in the years ahead, most are destined for the dinner table.

A peep at sheep and goat farms in Canada

We counted 3,555 sheep and goat farms in 2021. Just over one-third (1,270) were located in Ontario, with British Columbia (785) and Quebec (535) ranking second and third nationally.

Sheep and goat farms had the highest share of female operators (41.1%) among all farm types nationally at the time of the 2021 Census of Agriculture.

Over two in five of Canada’s sheep and goat farms had an annual household income of $100,000 or more in 2020.

Canada imports far more wool sweaters than it exports

Given Canada’s low level of domestic wool production and our need for sweaters during the cold winter months, it is not surprising that we import far more sweaters than we export.

In September 2023, Canada imported $25.3 million of wool, knitted or crocheted pullovers and cardigans, mostly from China ($10.7 million), Italy ($4.0 million) and Cambodia ($3.4 million).

Over the same period, domestic exports of Canadian-made knitted or crocheted wool pullovers and cardigans totalled just under $576,000, with most of the sweaters being exported from British Columbia and Ontario.

While our trade data are incredibly detailed, they don’t track how many of these sweaters are Christmassy.