I just want to put it on record that although I want the pearl finder to make some money, I do not think selling it is a great idea. Maybe he can lease it to another big hotel on Palawan for a small sum, but you and other people acting for him will realize the long term wisdom of making a big local deal out of these pearls and the clam they come from.
Why sell to a museum or a collector if you can rent or lease it to a local business and get that business to be part of the Society of the Giant Clam Pearl. This society can exist online and be worldwide, but if you get good science and good publicity, all of Palawan will benefit. Plus, some are exploiting these beauties for things still like nuclei for cultured pearls, They make terrible nuclei because the pearl breaks when drilled, way too often. There is so much that can be said on the foundation of these giant pearls, that I can only point to all the possibilities.
I labor under the stereotype that Filipinos are entrepreneurial and hardworking. Making these pearls a national treasure is a career that can be created by someone enterprising enough to find and write to the Pearl-Guide.com. In fact, taking up the cause of the giant clam as a national treasure will make careers for at least a dozen people directly, not to mention the indirect (read tourist) benefits.
I am so totally on my soap box about this. I hope someone sees the value in what I am saying.......
Getting the owners of two-three of these pearls together with agents willing to represent them in making the clams and their pearls national treasures, will create bonds between the finders/caretaker families and the venues where their pearls can be seen. Make a local Palawan in-thing about being the only place where these treasures can be found. And keeping them owned by locals and only leased out, buys time to build the local networks to protect them permanently. The family will never see much money if the pearl is sold, but if it is leased, the ownership is not passed away from Palawan.
Did anyone ever read, "The Pearl" by John Steinbeck?
Whenever I see a pearl that should be a local treasure pass out of the hands of the local family, I think of that book. the poor peasant who found that pearl did not have the internet, or even an agent with the internet. So I would like to see the local family get permanent benefits- just as I would like to see the Turbaned Pearl of Allah returned to the Pisi family. In fact, I would recruit them in any efforts to make a local alliance about keeping ownership the big pearls in Palawan. Whip up local sentiment. Do you guys have town halls or anything close to that? A place to advance the idea of the community taking charge of their local no-renewable treasures?
I will be happy to write on this subject further, and I hope some locals on Palawan will use my arguments to get friends, family, local news outlets everyone, to accept the idea of banding together behind the local family ownership of the giant pearls and horror at the idea of selling them for a few pieces of silver, based on all the lies about the original giant clam!
The first pearl has never sold yet. It is worth but little other than the value of its publicity.
But people still get greedy when they think about the first pearl. The most money ever to change hands for the first pearl was less than $5k, so that is probably over the market value. The rest was lies and hype.