PAPE’ETE (Pacnews) — The latest black pearl auction in French Polynesia at the weekend has netted an estimated 707 million French Pacific francs ($5.2 million), confirming new start for the French territory’s lucrative industry after a downtrend in the past few years.
The United Pearl Producers auction saw the sale of 214,000 black pearls to international buyers, including Hong Kong’s Yuen Hing Hong Pearl Ltd. and 19 Japanese companies.
There are three other pearl producers syndicates in French Polynesia: GIE Perles de Tahiti, GIE Poe Rava Nui and GIE Tahiti Pearl Producers.
Last year, President Gaston Flosse took over the pearl culture industry portfolio and introduced more stringent measures aimed at restoring quality of French Polynesia’s pearls.
Speaking at the auction, Flosse said it was “encouraging” to see that the effects of the quality-control measures were “starting to bear fruit.”
This would be seen through a stabilization of the prices after a “constant drop in the past few years.”
The trend saw several auctions snubbed by international buyers.
He said the fresh start would be reinforced by a new set of measures, to be introduced “by the end of June” to boost the French territory pearl production quality, including tighter control on the yearly production volume.
Effective July 1, a stricter standard will also be introduced, setting the minimum mother of pearl later thickness to 0.8 millimeters (as opposed to the previous 0.6-mm norm).
