June 1, 1913.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



461 



not desirable to allow grass to grow or to cultivate some cover 

 plant wliich will extinguish the weeds. There are one or two 

 cover plants which do not cause any permanent damage and have 

 even proved beneticial on some plantations, when thcj' have 

 lacked sufficient cash to maintain a proper upkeep and when the 

 only alternative was abandonment. I have experimented with 

 small areas under grass, but the results have not shaken my belief 

 in clean weeding, to be followed by digging or ploughing when- 

 ever there is a sufficiency of funds and labor. With a sufficient 

 supply of these sinews of war, the planter can hold his own, and 

 after three or four years, aided by the shade then afforded liy his 

 trees, he becomes master of the situation. 



THE HARVK.ST. 



The longed-for harvest then occupies his attention; and nowa- 

 days his thoughts turn, naturally enough, to the curing factory. 

 When I started tapping, the word factory had not been invented, 

 or, at any rate, used in this connection. I began by settling the 

 latex in my washing basin, rolling the ruljbcr with a beer bottle 

 (an empty one) and drying it on the veranda. Then acting under 

 strong domestic pressure, I moved the scene of operations to the 

 stables, and carried it on there until there was no room for the 

 horse. Next I built a little shed and bought a hand mangle. The 

 next move was to the factory of today. 



COST OF PRODUCTION. 



You will, I think, be interested to hear something about the 

 cost of production. We planters are frequently twitted about 

 our old promises of cheap production and these are compared with 

 actual costs, which in some cases exceed 60 cents (U. S. A. cur- 

 rency) a pound. The twitting, curiously enough, was most severe 

 when rubber was worth from two to three dollars, at which time 

 we had to pay an ad valorem export duty and charges, based on 

 these extremely high prices. Then, as there were not quite 

 enough experienced planters to go round, assistants, as well as 

 managers, thouglit they would like to participate in the general 

 prosperity and expected eitlier larger salaries or else commissions. 

 Our coolies also felt that what was good for master must be 

 good for man, and demanded either more pay or less work — ■ 

 generally both. Even the government suffered from the prevail- 

 ing spirit and on new applications increased the rent and charged 

 a premium on the land. Shareholders often seem to forget to 

 study the other side of the profit and loss account and to compare 

 the price actually obtained against the price we figured on when 

 estimating the cost of production. Moreover, we did not con- 

 template tapping our trees at four years old, at which age the 

 rubber is naturally more expensive to collect. 



1 admit that I speak with prejudice, but it seems to me only 

 right and proper that those responsible for supervision should 

 enjoy some of the fruits of the industry, when the industry can 

 well afford it. There are many other items of expenditure wliich 

 will automatically decline when the value falls. 



CLOSE VS. WIDE PL.^NTING. 



I do not desire to encourage the expectation that the yields from 

 our closely planted trees will approach that obtained from those 

 first planted. The latter were usually planted at wide distances, 

 and enjoy as much light and air as the heart of a tree can desire. 

 Ten years ago. I collected 18 lbs. of rubber in 35 days from one 

 of the trees planted by Sir Hugh Low : while from avenue trees 

 of my own planting, 14 years old and 7 feet in girth, results have 

 been obtained far in excess of those planted in the fields. It is 

 for this reason that I am inclined to deplore references in pub- 

 lished reports to yields per tree. All calculations should be 

 based upon the yield per acre. Probably the average number of 

 trees planted to the acre in Malaya is nearer 200 than 100. and 

 thinning out is inevitable as the trees expand. Thus, your trees 

 are an uncertain quantity, whereas the acre is always the same. 



.A well known botanist who studied the Hevca in its native 

 land used to urge us strongly to plant at 40 x 40 feet, i. e., 27 

 trees to the acre. 



The I-Icvca, like most quick growing trees, is extremely brittle; 

 and, at this distance, would suffer severely from the wind, but if 

 I allowed, for the sake of argument, that every tree reached 

 maturity, I found by comparing the results from avenue trees 

 against the results from closely planted fields that up to 8 years 

 old I should have harvested less than half the quantity of rubber 

 from the same area, had I adopted our botanical friend's advice. 



It is true that 1 should have economised to a certain extent on 

 the actual cost of collection but not sufficiently to compensate for 

 the loss of rubber. 



Thinning out as the trees get older and require more space, has 

 been opposed on the ground that the dead roots encourage the 

 spread of disease. I have pursued this policy for several years 

 past and cannot find that the fear is justified. Indeed, as the 

 years roll on, I become less anxious about plant diseases and 

 pests of all kinds. Fomes Semitosttis (our worst fungus disease) 

 and white ants (the most destructive of our insect pests) have 

 lost their terrors for me now that I know how to keep them in 

 check; and as the loss from all causes on the plantations I am 

 connected with does not average two per cent, after attaining 

 maturity, I cannot, justly, be charged with "turning the blind eye" 

 in tliat direction. 



^.^BOR PROSPECTS. 



The most plausible argument against the future output of 

 plantations is that of shortage of labor. It is true that most 

 plantations arc at times short of labor, but I think this must 

 generally be attributed to the manager's desire to keep down 

 expenses. Out of a total of 227,985 coolies employed on Malayan 

 plantations 126,665, or rather more than half, were imported from 

 India. The average period of service on the plantation does not 

 exceed two years — although many of these return after a holiday 

 in their native land; and the difficulty is to engage during the 

 recruiting season tlie exact number that are required to make 

 good the probable departures during the rest of the year, without 

 becoming burdened at the beginning with labor for which there is 

 no profitable employment. 



Within two years the plantation labor force has more than 

 doubled. I do not believe that liy increasing the rate of wages 

 any great stimulus would be given to Indian emigration. Tamil 

 coolies are more easily recruited for some plantations at half the 

 wages paid on others which are unpopular, owing to unhealthi- 

 ness or to some other cause ; and this fact is becoming more 

 clearly marked, since those employed at the lowest rates have 

 found themselves able to remit more than half their earnings to 

 India, and their savings in three or four years are sufficient to 

 establish them as capitalists when they return to their native 

 villages. 



The future success of estates wliich arc unpopular with Indians 

 will depend on the attractions they can offer to Chinese or 

 Japanese. To these, the rate of wages is of more importance 

 than any other consideration; and there is practically no limit to 

 the number that can be recruited — at a price. 



It must be remembered that by doubling the cost of labor we 

 do not double the cost of production. Generally speaking, the 

 average cost of tapping is less than one-half the total cost of 

 production, if wc include home charges; and as the majority of 

 the trees now being tapped have barely reached half their full 

 yielding capacity, labor rates can, if necessary, be materially in- 

 creased without raising the cost of production, when the trees 

 attain maturity. 



M.\.\URI\G. 



Recently, some consideration has been given to the question of 

 manures. From Ceylon some interesting results have been re- 

 ported, but in Malaya little has been done in this direction, except 

 on some estates where the soil is excessively rich in humus, and 

 lime has been applied to correct the acidity, with good results. 



My own opinion is that for some years to come, at any rate, 

 systematic cultivation of the soil will be of more value than any 

 manure, but the experiments in Ceylon are deserving of atten- 



