Kazuya Okuda Named New JBP Board Chairman

Kazuya Okuda, who has spent the past 21 years in the cultured pearl business, is the new chairman of the Japan Black Pearl Promotion Association.

Okuda has served as president of the company he founded in 1994, Okuda Pearl Trading Co., Ltd., of Kobe after having spent 10 years working for his father’s company, Okuda Pearl Co., Ltd.

Okuda succeeded Toyohiko Mikimoto of K. Mikimoto & Co. Ltd. as the Japan Black Pearl Promotion (JBP) chairman on Dec. 27.

PDT Created JBP in 1993

Perles de Tahiti was created in 1993 in French Polynesia as a trade association for the worldwide promotion of Tahitian cultured pearls and their byproducts. That same year, JBP was one of four promotion associations that Perles de Tahiti set up around the world. The others were located in the U.S.A., France and Germany.

Okuda, 51, has held several other posts in the pearl industry. He was named director of the Japan Pearl Exporters Association last July, director of the Japan Pearl Processing Exporters Association in May 2001, director of the Kobe Tax Payment Associations in May 2004 and councilor with the Kobe Foreign Trade Association in March 1999.

The September edition of Jewellery News Asia magazine described his company, Okuda Pearl Trading, as being “among the very few companies in Japan that specialize in Tahitian pearls, never exhibit overseas and concentrate on loose pearls and pearl strands without expanding into finished jewelry”.

“We Feel Happy as Long as Our Clients Do Well”—Okuda

“We just do what we ought to do,” Okuda told JNA. “”We are a pearl dealer and we sell to pearl wholesalers. There is no point in our exhibiting overseas or manufacturing jewelry to compete with our clients. Those things are outside our scope of business. We feel happy as long as our clients do well.”

When Poe Rava Nui celebrated its 25th anniversary in October 2004, seven pioneer international pearl wholesalers were honored. They included Kazuo Okuda of Okuda Pearl Trading Co., which has been a regular buyer at the Poe Rava Nui Tahitian pearl auctions.

He told JNA that his company visits French Polynesia every three months to buy directly from pearl farms and buy whole harvests in order to compete for better prices. That enables Okuda Pearl Trading to supply a large variety of loose Tahitian pearls and “nicely made necklaces”, JNA reported.

After 21 years of dealing with Tahitian cultured pearls, Okuda remains optimistic about the future despite smaller profit margins and competition. He told JNA he was confident about Tahitian pearls. “If not, I would not have started a company that specializes in Tahitian pearls.”