How did Alpaca fibre (yarn) spread to different countries? In 1836 an English wool merchant, Sir Titus Salt, began importing Alpaca yarn to England and British interest began. But by the early 20th century, due to the invention of man-made fibre, poaching and poor breeding programs, the South American alpaca was in steady decline. Realising the detrimental impact on its economy, the Peruvian government stepped in, giving back land and breeding rights to the pastoralists. With the success of the new breeding programs, alpaca herds started to flourish. By the 1980s South America was ready to legalise the exportation of alpacas. Twenty years ago, the first alpacas were imported in to the UK in 1993.