Ahmed bin Sulayem, CEO, DMCC

Just 70 years ago, residents of Dubai’s coastal terrain were surviving on an industry that demanded those within it to be pushed to their physical limits.

Pearl divers, with nothing more than a basic nose clip, greased skin to keep out the cold, and a lungful of air, were required to dive to depths of more than 100 feet to retrieve baskets of Arabian oysters from the rich sea bed.

Some divers were so practiced that they could stay for up to five minutes under the water, filling their buckets with the precious clams. But the dives claimed many lives too.

For the survivors the practice was a grueling task. With only an average of one oyster in every 1000 shells containing a precious prize, many divers were required to make hundreds of dives for a single pearl.
But the 3,000 year-old tradition was not to last. In the 1930’s, the Japanese invented the cultured pearl that led to an industry which created uniformly shaped and quality coloured pearls, all under strictly controlled conditions.
Literally overnight, the Gulf pearl trade crashed, and the residents of the south east Arabian Peninsula were forced to diversify.

And diversify they did – successfully turning Dubai into the prolific business and tourist hub that it is today. The economy is thriving, the country is enjoying a world class development boom and Dubai is a buzz-word on the international scene.

Revival of the fittest
But change is afoot once more as the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre – a new business concern handling the interests of the region’s commodities market, throws its weight behind reviving the region’s oldest market.

And in typical Dubai style, the plans are already in place to make it bigger, better and more impressive than anything else available, with an estimated US$30 million financing the pilot scheme alone.

A further US$40 million will then be invested to create a state-of-the-art pearling centre with working dhows, pearl farms and an underwater acrylic tunnel so that tourists can watch the production as it happens.

‘Pearls of Dubai’, the name of the new project, will be coordinated using Dubai investment and major figures from the Australia pearl industry who will transfer their modern know-how to the Arabian Peninsula.

Ahmed bin Sulayem, CEO of the DMCC, is unfazed by the pearl industry competition, which currently places Japan and South East Asia as the leaders of the world market. He is, he says, totally committed to the revival of the Arabian pearl and sees the venture as a way of reclaiming his country’s rich heritage.

Sulayem, who hails from a prominent UAE family, explains; “Pearls of Dubai demonstrates DMCC’s commitment to re-establishing the UAE as the leading destination for pearl diving and trading. It will bring together the best of the UAE’s pearling tradition and modern technological advancements of pearl farming.

“Most importantly, “Pearls of Dubai” will offer extensive training programmes for UAE nationals aspiring to join the pearl industry, thereby taking the industry back to its roots in the Gulf. The centre will focus on generating interest among young UAE nationals through interactive and interpretative programmes.”

Pearls of wisdom
But how will it all work? And how long will it be before Dubai really can present its own pearls on the international market once more?

Stephen Arrow, owner of Arrow Pearls and one of Australia’s most prominent pearl farmers, says he is confident the new product will be a success, and that Dubai’s natural resources provide “ideal conditions” for quality pearl yields.

“Dubai has a large natural resource of shells and if you rate the pearl shells from around the world out of 10, the Australian shells are pretty paltry five – but I would give the Emirati pearl shell about a 10. She’s a really robust little animal. She has been evolving here for perhaps over 100 million years and has adapted to the water conditions of the Arabian Gulf – and has even, dare I say it, inadvertently adapted to man’s decision to build his own islands and atolls in the sea,” he says.
Arrow, who owns pearl farms in Broome, Australia, says that global climatic change has been a factor in his move to Dubai.

“In north west Australia, we are blessed with wonderful natural resource of pearl shell very similar to what Dubai has but we also have one of the most intense cyclone corridors in the world.

“These cyclones are becoming larger and more powerful, occurring at times of the year and following patterns, the likes of which we’ve never, ever seen before. And in the last four years, my pearl farms in Western Australia have sustained four direct hits by extremely powerful cyclones and one of those farms was completely and utterly destroyed.

“So we’ve seen changing environment start to close some of the doors of opportunity for us in Australia, but in an equally strange way open other opportunities in other parts of the world. And in that respect, I now find myself in Dubai.”

Arrow explains that the Pearls of Dubai cultivation will begin with teams gathering wild oysters from the Arabian Gulf, which will then be used to propagate a pearl producing population.

“The populations I see here are healthy and they are doing very well. We will collect a certain size category or age category from the natural populations and we will put those shells under cultivation to produce pearls.

“Unlike the Japanese industry that artificially produces all its shells, we’ll be dealing with the natural shell that is very robust.”

The technique is highly specific, points out Arrow, who laughs off suggestions of sand grains and oyster irritations.

“It has nothing to do with sand or irritation – or hocus pocus of any sort,” he grins. “We place a shell-based nucleus in with epithelium tissue to produce a stem cell clone. We then do an operation where we place the shell-based nucleus inside the body of the shell. That nucleus then forms a matrix for the stem cells to form the pearl.”

And that’s it? “Well, not really – but we can’t disclose specific industry secrets,” says Arrow, who does disclose that the Pearls of Dubai, which will be available in the market within the next three years.

He adds; “We’re going to avoid the trap of the Japanese pearl industry of harvesting the pearls immaturely and enhancing the colours through processing. We’re going to absolutely ensure that these pearls will be the colour nature has ordained them to be. We won’t be dying them.
“A lot of pearls these days are not necessarily a natural colour and are usually produced in rather short cultivation periods. We’re going to ensure that the Dubai pearls are produced as naturally as possible under modern cultivation methods.”

Pearl of Arabia
But there is even more to the Pearls of Dubai project than resurrecting an ancient tradition. The motivation is to harness the financial pulling power of Dubai’s thriving tourism industry. A special seabed tunnel is planned along with traditional dhows and a pearl museum, which will document the history of traditional to modern pearling techniques.

“It’s called industrial tourism,” says Sulayem. “We have plans to ensure that visitors are shown the beauty of pearl farming by providing them with an impressive base stocked with dhows and all the correct facilities. This will enable them to witness the process for themselves. At the same time, the whole concept will be educational and it will reaffirm our heritage.”

There are also plans to make Dubai the region’s hub in terms of pearl commerce, where trading and commodity interests can be nurtured.

“What does Dubai offer that other hubs don’t?” says Arrow with a raised eyebrow. “I’ll tell you what. It has a huge commercial advantage because it’s extremely friendly in terms of tax and traders. It is ideally regionally located, being a central hub to Asia to Europe, Australia, Africa, China and its right on India’s doorstep. There are good rules in place for business and an excellent business centre infrastructure – the quality of which is fantastic. So, all those things coupled with a profound local identity make Dubai very favourable destination.”

Sulayem added; “The Arabian pearl diving tradition reached the far off shores of Northern Australia about 140 years ago. Today, that skill is returning to the region where it all began and bringing us the pearling industry of the 21st century. We look forward to the challenges that lie ahead.”