Diamond Jubilee of Empire Rubber

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 26, 1 February 1937, Page 9

Diamond Jubilee of Empire Rubber

ROMANCE Or EXPANSION In this diamond jubilee year of the growth of rubber within the British Empiro there are some 3000 square miles planted and close to 2,000,000 people occupied in its cultivation, says a writer in the Winnipeg Free Press. But the romantc economic expansion of rubber planting has come about only within the last thirty-five years. Rubber became difinitely established as a new, great industry in Malaya and Ceylon in 1901. For a time its production could not meet the demands for it, and the boom of 1909 sent the price up to 8s a pound. TMs price was attained temporarily largely because of the Restriction Scheme, whose artificial aids were resented widely by world consumers and had to be modified almost to abandonment. An unfortunate result of that boom in rubber was a production far exceeding the consumption, and restricting production to keep up prices was learned by the planters to be unsound. Rather, a policy of more scientific production with increased consumption at a reduced and even reducible price per pound found favour as the only reasonable means to bring stability to the growing industry. More Productivity

There is a point of increasing productivity. Scientific research in rubber planting is understood to have made great strides of late. A previous average yield of 500 pounds per acre is said to be likely within the next few years to become an average yield of 100 D pounds per acre. Recent experiments with blocks of young budded trees in the Federated Malay States do, indeed, show that yields up to 2500 pounds per acre are by no means impossible. There is, thus, every expectation of increasing production. That is to be met in the new policy of the growers to increase consumption by expanding the uses to which rubber can bo put. The question of price per pound is thought of secondary importance where the consumption is so expanded that it can consume all the production. The present price is about 8d per pound. This is said to give a fair profit to the planters. They are said by Mr John Hockin in an article in the Empire Review, to be against a rise in price above that figure. For, they believe, that the lower the price can be kept, the greater will be the expansion of consumption. Rubber, writes Mr Hockin, at 3d a pound has been talked of for the future “and may easily come to pass when restriction is taken off. With the advances now being made in agricultural methods and organisation of plantations, there is no reason why a fair profit should not eventually be able to be shown with rubber selling at this figure. Such a price would stimulate consumption tremendously, and thus indirectly safeguard the future of ohe of the greatest of the Empire’s industries.

The future in rubber planting depends, however, on increasing consumption of rubber all over the world. This is being done enormously. Rubber surfacing for roads is being tried, as is rubber fot flooring in buildings and homes. The motor industry is using rubber more and more. At' present, it is claimed, a 15 h.p. car of normal typo contains as much as 1501 b of raw rubber. The day has long been past when rubber was used only for tyres. Rubber furniture is in the experimental stage, but has not so far become feasible from the consideration of cost. Rubber upholstery is one of the greatest advances in utilising rubber in the home. In agriculture and other basic industries rubber is increasingly used, lu these and many other directions the rubber growers are hoping to find consumption for their scientifically increased production. They do not appear to be worried about their natural product being displaced by any artificial composition. In this connection Mr Hockin says; “Synthetic rubber at a comparative price, the bogy of rubber planters for so many years, has now been proved beyond the realms of practical possibility for many years to come. So we find that, provided consumption and production <3o not again diverge too far apart, both investors and those 2,000,000 employees of the industry in the East have no cause for anxiety."

This may be so. But is it not true that Germany and Italy have produced synthetically a product which has taken the place of raw rubber to some extent? The synthetic prod-ction has not substituted for raw mbber, but it has kept down consumption that would otherwise have taken planters' rubber. The new commodity may be a makeshift. It cannot, as has been said, be produced at less or equal cost than can raw rubber, and at comparative cost cannot be a grave competitor. The Malayan rubber planter need not, however, take too much for granted in dismissing synthetic rubber, just as the Australian wool grower is not ignoring the poorer substitutes for his product synthetically manufactured at heavy cost in Germany. Rubber planting in the British Empire has had a romantic origin and a remarkable growth. it compares in its diamond jubilee with the romance and growth of cocoa planting in West Africa.