453 
The entire cultivated area devoted to bananas in the Archipelago was 
reported as being 33,913 hectares (83,802 acres), upon which 14,078,600 
bunches of the fruit were said to have been produced. This also repre- 
sents the number of stalks which practically go to waste at the present 
time, for, after the fruit is harvested, they are simply allowed to rot on 
the ground. These data do not include the wild, nonedible species of 
plantains which are so common in all parts of the Islands. 
Dr. Forbes Royle *° in discussing plaintains says: 
Of the value of plantain fiber for paper making, there can, | conceive, be no 
doubt. Some paper, though unbleached, but excellent as far as substanee and 
tenacity are concerned, was sent from India by Dr. Hunter in 1851. In 1846 
Mr. May showed the author some beautiful specimens of note and letter paper 
made from plantain fiber. Mr. Routledge subsequently made some excellent 
paper, both of a tough and of a fine quality, from fibers of this species of Musa. 
The Bulletin of the Royal Kew Gardens for August, 1894, contains a 
valuable summary of information relating to bananas and plantains from 
which the following brief extracts have been taken: 
In Jamaica a series of experiments, undertaken by Mr. Morris in 1884, showed 
that the plantain fiber (Musa sapientum var. paradisiaca) was whiter and finer 
than ordinary banana fiber and that it approached more nearly the fine, glossy 
character of Manila hemp. A banana stem weighing 108 pounds yielded 25 
ounces of cleaned fiber, or at the rate of 1.44 per cent of the gross weight. A 
plantain stem weighing 25 pounds yielded 74} ounces of cleaned fiber, or 1.81 
per cent of the gross weight. 
The experiments of ten years on a cultivation of from 400 to 480 acres in 
plantains has shown that, first, 700 to 800 stems are cut per acre per annum, either 
for fruit or in consequence of having been blown down by high winds or from 
disease or other reasons; second, if planted 8 feet apart and cut every eight 
months for stems alone an acre would give 1,400 to 1,500 stems each cutting, 
or about 4,500 in two years; third, plantain stems average 2} pounds of clean 
and 13 pounds discolored and broken fiber, the latter only fit for coarse paper. 
These results, however, were obtained with very imperfect machinery; fourth, 
the average weight of a plantain stem is 80 pounds. 
Complete stalks of wild plantain from Tarlac Province, Philippine 
Islands, were found to average over 100 pounds in weight. One entire 
stalk was sawed into short cross sections and subjected to strong pressure. 
The dried residue was 9.3 per cent of the gross weight of the stem. 
Crude fiber estimation (Weende Method) gave 2.46 per cent of the gross 
weight of the stem. A second stalk was divided longitudinally into 
narrow strips. ‘These were drawn under a knife edge, which removed 
the greater proportion of the water and cellular matter. The remain- 
ing thin, fibrous ribbons were boiled in a dilute solution of sodium 
carbonate containing a proportionate quantity of quicklime until the 
“Royle: The Fibrous Plants of India, p. 87. 
