Beche-de-mer trade a success story

LAST week, I shared on social media the beche-de-mer (sea cucumber) trade that has been going on in our coastal and island provinces.
A marine biologist/researcher informed me and a group of young people that the trade has put money into the hands of our locals.
Limanak, a small island off the coast of Kavieng, in New Ireland, netted K1.2 million. That is a success story.
Another source told me that Nago Island Mariculture and Research Facility (NIMRF), in Kavieng, is helping the islanders farm sea cucumbers.
Instead of having sea cucumbers struggling to reproduce naturally in the wild, the marine biologists at NIMRF are helping the locals grow them in tanks.
I visited the research facility recently and saw how researchers created the environment for the sea cucumber to spawn and grow and later transferred to the ocean.
You can see me holding two of those organisms, which are about a few months old. They are growing up in tanks.
The good thing about the bech-de-mer trade is that the money is going from the buyers straight to the local community. Lots of money.
People are seeing money like never before.
The people harvesting sea cucumbers are seeing what people in East Sepik and elsewhere experienced decades ago when vanilla was bringing in big loads of cash to locals. The locals in ESP were buying brand new vehicles from Lae and Madang as never before.
Currently the islanders who are harvesting sea cucumbers are building their permanent houses or buying their boats and engines without any assistance from any MP or outside source. They do not need a portion of DSIP funds or foreign aid or massive loans from abroad.
This is a success story.
It goes to show again that we already have millions (or even billions) of kina worth of stuff in our seas and land.
All it needs are MPs to consult local scientists and researchers on how best we can advise the locals to manage and harvest our natural resources without flying overseas for loans, or cutting into the limited DSIP funds that can be used to take care of other essential services.
Think about it. Millions and billions of kina are already here in the rural communities and not in Waigani, Hong Kong, Shanghai or Canberra.
The MPs with their advisers should do their homework and assist such trades that can bring millions of kina straight to the villagers without any hassle.
I am thinking about beche-de-mer, but you can also apply the same mentality to vanilla, copra, cocoa, coffee, tuna, galip nuts, to name a few.
Unlike oil and gas, these are all renewable resources that can be sustained.
Also, if we invest in these renewable resources, we do not need to open another mine and therefore prevent pollution.
We must be aware that there is a boom in business in the provinces whenever trades in things like sea cucumbers are occurring.
The shopping centres are having shelves of goods emptied, the hardware shops are running out of building materials and the banks are having hundreds of thousands to millions of kina passing through.
Plans by local MPs must be put into place to cater for the boom.
Fuel stations should open along the coast or on islands to help the locals easily get fuel and accessories.
Security must be in place to protect the hardworking locals.
We hear of sea pirates operating in Milne Bay. It is time a sea police unit is formed to patrol the waters in that province to protest hardworking locals from being targetted by lazy people who want to rob them of their hard-earned fruits.
As for the beche-de-mer, we will wait some more months before the ban on harvesting is lifted by the National Fisheries Authority.
And then we will have millions of kina running through the hands of the locals again.
As for the locals, they should be educated, too, on how to best use the money earned from the sale of sea cucumbers: Do not spend all your money on alcohol. Buy materials for your new house or buy a new boat and outboard motor.
Save money, too, for future use – including paying for your school children’s needs.
The millions of kina are already here. But you must be wise to take advantage of that and raise your standard of living. You can do it!

Motumotu Tauna