Jacques Branellec (born 1948) is the French co-founder, with the Filipino businessman Manuel Cojuangco, of Jewelmer, the Philippine pearl-farming and jewellery house that is one of the principal producers of the golden South Sea pearl. The company, founded in 1979, is widely credited with the commercial development of the gold-lipped Pinctada maxima as a viable cultured-pearl species and with bringing the golden South Sea pearl into the mainstream of the international fine-jewellery trade.

Background

Branellec, a Brittany-born marine biologist by training, arrived in the Philippines in the 1970s during a period when South Sea pearl culture was concentrated in Australian, Indonesian and Burmese waters and the gold-lipped Pinctada maxima variety was a minor sub-population. With Manuel Cojuangco he established the first Jewelmer farm in Palawan in 1979, working initially through trial-and-error grafting and water-quality programmes that drew on Branellec's marine science background and on transferred Japanese and Australian husbandry techniques.

The golden South Sea pearl

The principal commercial achievement of the partnership was the development of consistent production of the deep saturated golden pearl from Pinctada maxima, which had previously been an unreliable by-product of white South Sea farming. The work involved selective breeding for golden-lipped donor stock, refinement of nucleus implantation, and management of the long (two- to three-year) culturing cycle in tropical Palawan waters. By the 1990s Jewelmer had become the dominant supplier of golden South Sea pearls to the international wholesale market and the brand had begun to establish a vertically integrated retail operation.

Industry institutions

Branellec was active in the establishment and governance of the South Sea Pearl Consortium and the SSP industry's joint promotion programmes through the 1990s and 2000s, alongside Australian Paspaley and Indonesian Atlas Pacific representatives. Jewelmer is a CIBJO-affiliated company and Branellec has spoken at CIBJO and GIA pearl-industry events on responsible-aquaculture issues.

Recognition and legacy

Branellec was made a Commander of the French Légion d'Honneur in recognition of his work in the Philippine pearl industry and Franco-Philippine commercial relations, and Jewelmer holds the official designation of national gem of the Philippines for its work with the golden South Sea pearl. The next generation, including Jacques Christophe Branellec as Vice Chairman, now manages day-to-day operations.