The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun SATURDAY, MAY 30, 1942. THE GREATEST SHORTAGE

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 126, 30 May 1942, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun SATURDAY, MAY 30, 1942. THE GREATEST SHORTAGE

ru^)hcr for ( ' ivi 'i an l| sc for three years" is the finding, or prediction, of a committee of the f'nited States Senate which has investigated the situation in the greatest, rubber-using country in the world. That statement in its implications is perhaps equal in importance to any other event of this month, the battles in Russia and Libya not excepted. A Krrat. deal of rubber will wear out in three years. The committee also analysed the causes of the rubber shortage, which it attributed to the selfishness of the motor industry, the greed of British and Dutch rubberowning interests and the operations of international cartels. These findings are no doubt controversial, but even if they are fully justified they do no more than furnish reasons why the stocks of raw rubber in the Cnited States at the outbreak of the war with Japan were low. What matters infinitely more is the fact that stocks, whether high or low, cannot, be renewed from the same sources—for these sources are now under the control of Japan. Moreover, even if they could be recovered from Japan to-morrow, their production could not be fully restored; the application of the "scorched earth" policy was intended to prevent the Japanese from profiting by their conquests for a long time to come. Nor should It. be overlooked that, the Japanese have no need even to attempt to restore to productivity the whole rubber industry which fell into their hands; they may well be content to attempt to gain from it supplies sufficient for their own needs. It seems inevitable, therefore, that even if the war ended suddenly, and the immense demand for rubber for military purposes ceased, a considerable time must elapse before normal supplies could be restored. The committee's finding. "No rubber for civilian supplies for three years," may even be an underestimate. T- n'^'i l^..^ Cnat L rnmrn ' t,;ro was concerned with the requirements of the nitetl States; but every other country which until recently relied largely lor rubber upon the territories now occupied bv the cnemv is gravely a fleeted, ant New Zealand is no exception. Often in this war we have been warned of the consequences of a shortage of petrol, and continuous S" '! have been made to conserve and build up supplies. No comparable made to conserve rubber. Like so much else, rubber supplies were considered to be assured by the existence of the fortress or Sin pa pore. In consequence, the Dominion is now faced with what appears to be by far the most serious shortage of all and necessitv nfiTn m u imp N T rati IVCIy1 VCIy that extraordinary efforts be made to minl chnnJll [ 2 short vicw should be taken of the problem, nor should here he any hesitation in imposing the most drastic of restrictions on avoidable consumption. If in all probability such restrictions will become inescapable in six months' or one year's time, they should be imposed now. tn so far as it is possible to reclaim used rubber—and nihhnr 1 J n , np £ no £ fnr that P ur P° se in Auckland—no scrap of rnnnpHinn ti" dominion, should be left unreclaimed. In this hn ordinary peacetime standards of cost of production must be severely modified. It will no doubt be "uneconomic" to reclaim transport reprocess much of the used rubber available: but it would it AnH l ' neco " ornic 'to allow essential services to stop for the lack of it. And elementary prudence demands that extraordinary measures S7„SS£!£ s-sa Si