Post Pandemic Pearls | PEARL FEATURE L to R: Atlas Pearls - An overhead view of an Atlas Pearls farm located in beautiful East Java; Ikecho necklace; Autore Pearls. The project was dubbed PearlBone. The collaboration by the University of Western Australia and biotech business Marine Biomedical aims to develop PearlBone using nacre - which is abundant in the region - as a suitable alternative for patients needing bone grafting and reconstructive surgery. Minghao Zheng is Professor of Orthopaedic Research at the UWA and is the co-inventor of the PearlBone project. He says momentum behind the project is continuing to build. “It’s a very exciting time for the project, we’ve recently been awarded government support at both the Federal and State level to establish a medical facilitiy in the Kimberely region to manufacture PearlBone product,” he says. “It’s a project that continues to have a very wide scope in terms of application, the most common application will be treating bone traumas which occur as a result of things like car accidents. “We’re also looking at applications in terms of dentistry, which would mostly be fillings. “PearlBone really has the potential to completely change the face of the pearl farming industry in Australia forever. “It’s completely reshaping the purposes of farming and what can be achieved with the product. If the project is successful it may lead to an increase in depmand which in turn leads to more farms. “That leads to a bigger industry with more and more people being hired from local communities, boosting local communities, which is great.” Australia: Technological advance Cygnet Bay Farms operates out of both Western Australia and New South Wales and owner James Brown said there were a lot of lessons to be learned exiting the pandemic. “The biggest takeaway from the pandemic and everything we’ve been through over the last two years I believe has been the importance of tracking and tracing,” he says. “We’d all heard of QR codes before the pandemic but did we really utilise them, or understand how they work and what they’re capable of? Learning how these sorts of technologies can be used in the pearl industry is crucial to success. “The restrictions on travel between borders really showed how fragile of an industry it can be and how susceptible we are to disaster. Thankfully we don’t need to rely on flying technicians in from overseas but I know that’s one thing which really troubled a lot of Australian pearl producers. “Purchasing pearls continues to be a very emotive purchase for consumers and using emerging technologies to STATISTICS Pearls in Numbers 7500 estimated age of the oldest pearl known to researchers, which was discovered in the UAE 100 million estimated value of the world’s most expensive pearl, found by a fisherman in the Phillipines 216 pearls are found on the Susa necklace, the world’s oldest piece of pearl jewellery 1 in every 10,000 wild oysters contain pearls 6 kilograms weight of the legendary Pearl of Allah demonstrate to consumers that pearls are being produced in an environmentally friendly way, by organisations that are aware of the importance of something like climate change, can go a long way towards allevating any stress or concerns that a customer may have, and as a result keep those emotive purchases viable.” India: Safety comes first India was one of the country’s hardest hit by the COVID pandemic, recording the second highest number of confirmed cases in the world – trailing only the the US. More than 500,000 people lost their lives. Moksh <strong>Jeweller</strong>y is based in Mumbai and represents more than 50 years of family legacy and tradition creating high fashion designs with an undertone of tradition. Founder and owner Milan Tanvir Chokshi began the business in 2005 and says that the pandemic was a challenge unlike any other he had experienced before, and that it changed the way pearls would be used in designs across the years to come. “The biggest challenge for us was ensuring the health and safety of our artisans,” he says. “A business has to be geared up for any economic volatility, so that wasn’t really as concerning for us. But an unprecedented halt to life such as the one we witnessed is something that we were the least prepared for. “However with the support of the local government in Mumbai, we were able to get the permissions to operate our export business and this kept everything going. At a restricted pace but it continued all the same. “Pearls have become more and more visibe in jewellery over the last few years and I think it’s possibly because they are comfortable to wear and fit easily into a casual or luxury mode. Comfort has been key for everyone, particularly while they were stuck at home over the past couple of years.” Affect on European pearl retailing While pearls aren’t farmed in the UK they remain a staple of high end fashion in cities such as London. Yoko London was founded in the early 1970s and has three generations of family business experienced working with 13 different pearl farms around the world, breaching markets right across Europe. Yoko London CEO Michael Hakimian said that international retailers faced similar challenges to Australia’s homegrown producers and distributers. Restrictions on travel were just one of many challenges created by the pandemic. “People had limited opportunities to shop for jewellery in person,” Hakimian says. 32 | <strong>May</strong> <strong>2022</strong>
Producing more than 550,000 pearls each year across 7 farm sites throughout the South Seas, Atlas Pearls is a global leader in the production of sustainable South Sea pearls, certified from the source. Available online around the world. ATLASPEARLSTRADE.COM
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