Conditions for development of pearl farms and production of pearls: state of the art, potential and perspectives

摘要

Pearl farms with pearl oysters, abalones, freshwater pearl mussels, and some snails and bivalves having attractive shell, stand out for their general feasibility and commercial value of products. To achieve acceptable profitability, technique-operational validation and assimilation are required in real conditions into multivariate scenarios where the plans sometimes present radical differences even at spot- scale. Pearl culture appears as added value that depends on the input of viable juveniles and efficient management of production cycles. In this work the art of pearl culture is presented as a skill to be acquired from practice and training, which is accessible to any producer that accomplished continuity in the farming procedures. The historical development of pearl culture, from the ancient Buddha Pearls to pearls in vitro, has happened in linear events through improvements of manual and mechanical means. The wide diffusion of pearl farms relies on episodes of environmental history throughout special coincidences in the regions. The review of these transformation processes, based on study and interpretation of evidences and evaluation of potentials in the 21st century, projects about mollusk farming for shells, nacre or pearls, are analyzed under objective arguments in terms of advantages, disadvantages and prospects to access on one of the most sensitive luxury markets, for its characteristics of natural wealth, dependence on regional and global dynamics and intrinsic difficulties to start and maintain a high- risk technological project, with unpredictable results.