June 1, 1920.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



MEW YORK 



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HENRY C. PEARSON, F.R.G.S., Editor 



Vol. 62. 



JUNE 1, 1920 



No. 3 



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A SETBACK TO FILIPINO PROGRESS. 



IT has been an open secret that for some months past 

 American capitalists have been striving to reach some 

 agreement whereby acreage of jungle land could be se- 

 cured to plant rubber on a scale comparable with Far 

 Eastern enterprises. 



The rubber offer was to plant 100,000 acres in Min- 

 danao, and incidentally to establish a factory in Manila. 

 At the same time another group wished to acquire suffi- 

 cient wild land to install a vast camphor plantation. 

 These two offers were the result of Filipino propaganda 

 asking for American capital and the assurance from 

 prominent officials that every facility would be afforded 

 to investors. 



The stumbling blocks were the existing law that no 

 company can acquire more than 2,500 acres and the law 

 against the importation of Chinese or other plantation 

 laborers. These laws the Filipinos refused to amend. 

 The offers have been therefore withdrawn, and the 

 Philippines lose their chance probably for all time. 

 ^ One woXild like to comment severely on the crass folly 

 oiof such a course. The Filipinos clamor for capital and 

 make investment impossible; they agitate for independ- 



ence and show absolute incapacity for self-government. 

 They are ready for neither. 



GUAYULE IS RUBBER, NOT A "SUBSTITUTE." 



ONK of our esteemed contemporaries, in an otherwise 

 excellent article on "Attempts at Rubber Substi- 

 tutes" hardly does justice to guayule; indeed, leaves the 

 reader with the impression that it is poor stuff at best. 

 Speaking of Mexican beginnings, he says : 



"This experimentation resulted in a certain 

 measure of success in that a low grade material 

 was manufactured which was a capable substi- 

 tute for the poorest grades of rubber." 



The poorest grade of rubber is perhaps untreated pon- 

 tianak or jelutong, which at one time was a drug on the 

 market at 4 to 6 cents a pound. Even in its beginnings 

 guayule was worth much more than that. It was, of 

 course, a "capable substitute'' for low grade rubber, but 

 so was Para rubber. It is not, however, low grade. On 

 the contrary, well prepared guayule is classed among the 

 medium rubbers. 



Farther on the writer says : 



"One mill was built in Torreon, in the State of 

 Coahuila, where business was carried on success- 

 fully for some time. At the period of its greatest 

 prosperity about 600,000 pounds of rubber, or 

 whatever this low grade material might be called, 

 was turned out each month." 



The Torreon product was sold as rubber for the very 

 good reason that it was rubber and a very excellent 

 product at that. Certain of the old timers were against 

 It from the first and insisted that it was a substitute and 

 that in spite of the fact that any fair definition of the 

 word "rubber" must perforce include guayule. 



At present guayule is quiescent but, our contemporary 

 to the contrary nothwithstanding, it will again be a big 

 factor and that within a decade. 



BALATA CULTIVATION. 



Rli:i:i:k cur/nv.\TiON is so big and so successful that 

 it is to-day a commonplace achievement. This 

 in spite of the fact that it was deemed a "pipe dream" 

 by trade leaders during its beginnings. The needs of 

 the world brought it about just as the need for plastics, 

 gutta percha, balata and chicle will in turn bring 

 about plantations that produce these gums. 



Of course the problem is a more difficult one. The 

 Sapotaceae are slow-growing trees and the product is 

 not large. Nor do any of them show the "wound 

 response" that proved such a boon for the Hevea 

 planter. Nevertheless, one should not forget the 

 large gutta percha plantations in Java instituted by 

 the farsighted Dutch. 



It is also gratifying to note that balata is being 

 grown in the Dutch East Indies in a small way, to be 

 sure, but it is a beginning. The British Government 



