What is the history of trepanging for sea cucumbers?

Trepanging is comparable to clamming, crabbing, lobstering, musseling, shrimping and other forms of "fishing" whose goal is acquisition of edible invertebrates rather than finfish. Slow-moving creatures related to sea stars and sea urchins, sea cucumbers are found on the sea floor. As such, trepanging is accomplished by spearing, diving, dredging or simply picking the animals up by hand when they are exposed at low tide.





To supply the markets of Southern China, Muslim Makassar Indonesia trepangers traded with Indigenous Australians of Arnhem Land from at least the 18th century or likely prior. This Macassan contact with Australia is the first recorded example of interaction between the inhabitants of the Australian continent and their Asian neighbours. This contact had a major impact on the Indigenous Australians. The Makassar exchanged goods such as cloth, tobacco, knives, rice and alcohol for the right to trepang coastal waters and employ local labour. Makassar pidgin became a lingua franca along the north coast among different Indigenous Australian groups who were brought into greater contact with each other by the seafaring Macassan culture.





Archeological remains of Makasar contact include trepang processing plants from the 18th and 19th centuries are still be found at Australian locations such as Port Essington and Groote Eylandt, and the Makasar-planted tamarind trees (native to Madagascar and East Africa) introduced by the seafaring Muslims. .


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trepanging





The Macassans were Indonesians from the trading center of Macassar in the southern Island Sulawesi in Java, which for centuries had been the outlet for the trepang trade with China. They came in fleets of boats called praus, which they used to collect this small sea animal. There is not sufficient evidence to make an accurate account of the time period these people had been coming to the northern shores of Australia. Some historians say fishermen were coming for hundreds of years - others say they arrived in the seventeenth century.





The demand for trepang to be brought into China did not emerge until the 1600s. Maritime expansion and commercial development by Islam and China spread throughout South East Asia into the Javanese archipelago. The city of Macassar was captured by the Dutch in 1669 and was established as a center for European trade and colonialism. Macassar began representing Dutch colonization outside Java.





The Macassans came to Australia to collect trepang and import it back to Macassar. From there they exported the trepang to China. Besides trepang, Macassans imported timber (iron-wood, cypress pine, sandalwood), pearl, pearlshell and tortoiseshell. Apart from Northen Australia, the main fishing grounds for trepang were all in the Indian and Western pacific Oceans.





Australian trepang made up the largest part of Macassan exports and of the total import into China. The trepang industry in Australia was large and well organized. Approximately 2 000 Macassans spent 4-5 months a year gathering trepang, which fetched considerable amounts of money for their financers in Macassar, and they enjoyed high social standing in the community. European businessman controlled commercial trading, while actual shipping to South China was handled by the Chinese businessman living in Macassar. Exporting of trepang from Macassar to China was handled from Singapore. Most voyages were financed and outfitted by merchants who supplied basic items like piculs, rice, kajang(awning mats made from palm leaves), ataps(similar mats made of nipa palm leaves), catties of rattan, palm-leaf sail cloth, iron pots for cooking, parring bamboo for building etc.


http://www.aiaa.org.au/news/news15/seacu鈥?/a>