February i, 1903 ] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



153 



which 7487 acres were planted in " Para rubber." In Perak the 

 government gardens supplied Pard rubber seeds and seedlings 

 extensively to private planters, and experiments were begun in 

 the cultivation of Castilloa and some African rubber species. 

 Mention is made of thetepping, in August, 1901, of a few Para 

 rubber trees 12 years old, which yielded an average of 4 pounds 

 of rubber, and of Fkiis elastica of the same age, which yielded 

 an average of 10 pounds per tree. These reports throughout 

 refer favorably to the progress in rubber planting and express 

 the belief that it will prove very profitable if anything like pres- 

 ent prices of rubber should be maintained. 



CONSERVATIVE RUBBER PRODUCTION CO. 



[Plantation at Ystli:ja. department of Palenqiie, state of Chiapas, Mexico. Of- 

 lice : 319-320 Parrott building, San Francisco. California.] 



Incorporated October 26, 1901, under the laws of Arizona ; 

 capital $1,200,000, in shares of $200. The company own 6670 

 acres of land, on the Tulija river, acquired from the Mexican 

 government in July, 1901. Rubber only is to be planted, 600 

 trees per acre, to be reduced later to 200. Shares are oflfered, to 

 be paid for in monthly installments, or at reduced rates for 

 cash. No income is estimated before the end of the fifth year. 

 Theofiicers — John Ballard, president; Dr. O. V. Sessions, vice 

 president; Byron Oilman, treasurer; J. S. Cannon, secretary 

 and general manager — have long been engaged successfully in 

 business enterprises on the Pacific coast, and Mr. Cannon has 

 had several years experience in developing rubber plantations 

 in Mexico. E. VV. Graves, plantation director, is an experienced 

 horticulturist. 



ORIZABA RUBBER PLANTATION CO. 



[Plantation at El .Salto, state of Cliiapas, Me.vico. Office: No. 215 Dearborn 

 street, Chicago. Illinois.] 



The first number of the Chiapas News, a periodical published 

 by this company, contains a portrait and sketch of their plan- 

 tation manager, Dr George B. Abbott, a native of Dixon, Illi- 

 nois, born in 1856. During six years he lived in Honduras, en- 

 gaged in merchandising and tropical planting, and acquiring 

 such knowledge of tropical labor problems as to fit him for 

 such a position as he now holds. 



RUBBER PLANTING IN THE STRAITS SETTLEMENTS. 

 The Tropical Agriculturist (September, 1902) says : " A lit- 

 tle while ago Mr. H. K. Rutherford pressed us to try and ob- 

 tain statistics of the area planted in rubber in the Straits, etc. 

 It is a difficult matter to do so, as there are so many different 

 states and districts embraced in the Malay peninsula. But 

 from the returns given in the Singapore and Straits' Directory 

 for 1932, which has just reached us, we venture to compile the 

 following figures, simply as a rough approximation : 



District. Area under Rubber, 



British North Borneo About 100 acres. 



Johore About 200 acres. 



Negri Semblilan About 678 acres. 



Perak About 540 acres. 



Province Wellesley .... About 100 acres. 



Selangor About 2,g26 acres. 



Total 4,544 



" This is against 3356 acres in Ceylon. But our local returns 

 are far more to be relied on than the guesses we have applied 

 to the estates in the Straits, etc. It should be the duty of the 

 Selangor Planters' Association to collect reliable returns of 

 the actual extent of rubber planted on each garden or estate 

 and so to correct the figures which we venture to put forward 

 above." - — [The figures given in this paragraph for Negri 

 Semblilan should be compared with the detailed statement 

 for the same province which appeared in The India Rubber 

 World of November i, 1902 (page 57). That showed an acre- 

 age of 592 planted to rubber alone, and a total acreage of 4294 



planted to rubber in combination with either coffee or cocoa- 

 nuts.] 



MEXICAN PLANTING NOTES. 



Mr. A. G. Weiss, of Charleston. Illinois, whose private rub- 

 ber plantation in the state of Tabasco, Mexico, has been men- 

 tioned in these pages, is understood to be arrranging to plant 

 400 acres more in rubber this year. 



= Mr. C. M. Kendall's contract with the Isthmus Plantation 

 Association of Mexico (Wilwaukee, Wisconsin) having expired 

 on jannary i— its shares having been practically all sold— he is 

 organizing a new company, to be called the Mexico Batavia 

 Plantation Co. A partially developed plantation has been se- 

 cured in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico, on which there is already 

 a considerable acreage of Castilloa elastica, besides some Paia 

 and Ceara rubber trees, which he reports to be doing well. Mr. 

 Kendall's address is Wells building, Milwaukee. 



RAILWAY THROUGH ANOTHER RUBBER FIELD. 



A DECREE of the Portuguese government dated November 

 27, 1902, grants to Robert Williams, a British subject, a conces- 

 sion to build a railway 1400 kilometers [ = 870 miles] in length, 

 from Lobito bay, on the Angola seaboard, to Katanga, on the 

 Eastern frontier of the colony, where connection can be made 

 with the Cape to Cairo system. The concessionaire is required 

 to deposit ^100,000 as a guarantee that he will form a company 

 with _£2,ooo,ooo capital, with its head otiice at Lisbon, and 

 complete the railway within eight years from January i, 1903. 

 .Angola is the extensive Portuguese possession south of the 

 Congo river, from which is derived the Benguella, Loanda, and 

 Ambriz grades of rubber. Of late years the export of these 

 rubbers has declined, which fact is attributed in part to the 

 exhaustion of the supplies near the coast, but more particularly 

 to the better transportation facilities to and from the Congo 

 Free State since the completion of the Congo railway. Angola 

 is a fertile district, and with a railway it is believed that not 

 only would the rubber trade revive, but the general develop- 

 ment of the country would be promoted. 



Katanga, mentioned above, is a province in the extreme 

 southeast part of the Congo Free State, which of late has begun 

 to be developed in an energetic way by a strong Belgian com- 

 pany. This province is exceptionally rich in rubber, from all re- 

 ports, which fact may tend to encourage Mr. Williams's railway 

 project. Mr. Williams, by the way, is an engineer in the service 

 of a British concern east of Lake Tanganyika, and some time 

 ago he informed the Comi.e Special Katanga that while jour- 

 neying through their territory he had found important sources 

 of gold. The committee have encouraged his further investi- 

 gations, with results that have surpassed all expectations. This 

 may prove to be a still further incentive to the building of the 

 railway. All these details are mentioned for the reason that 

 whatever tends to the opening up any rubber producing coun- 

 try is helpful in making rubber more accessible and in placing 

 the production of rubber under more intelligent supervision. 



The administration of the Cie. du Chemin de Fer du Congo 

 (the Congo State railway) are reported to be about to invite 

 tenders for the supply of a large electric installation and 30 

 electric locomotives, the latter to be employed on various small 

 branch lines constructed to secure better communication with 

 rubber producing districts. This railway, 241 miles in length, 

 around the falls in the Congo river, between Matadi and Leo- 

 poldville, has now been in successful operation for several 

 years. The net profits for the business year 1898-99 were 

 6,242,09386 francs; for 1 899-1900 they were 8,001,500.43 francs ; 

 for 1900-01 they were 7.778,397-90 francs. The capitalization is 

 30,000,000 francs. 



