530 



Green manures will be tried in the place of allowing all and 

 sundry plants to grow on the land between crops, and this as well as 

 seed selection experiments will be added to the present plots. 



When the experiments have been continued for another season, 

 the results will be analysed and discussed; various deductions may be 

 drawn from the table of last year's results which is compiled just in 

 time for this report. 



Coffee. 



The acreage under coffee has increased a little, there being 10,833 

 last year as compared with 9,708 at the end of 1906. A large acreage 

 of coffee is continually being killed out by the rubber trees with which 

 it has been interplanted growing up and shading the coffee bushes so 

 that they do not grow vigorously and only struggle in producing less 

 and less fruit. Selangor possesses 75 per cent of the whole acreage. 

 The crops have been on the whole good, but the figure of acreage crop per 

 acre is not of any value as a great deal of the coffee growing under 

 rubber and yielding little or no fruit is included. 



Tapioca. 



The cultivation of tapioca (Manihot utilissima) , which occupies 

 about 10,000 acres in the Federated Malay States, and more than 

 double that acrea in the Straits Settlements, continues to give large 

 returns to the careful planter. The tapioca plant is specially free from 

 disease of leaf, stem or root, and its temporary cultivation makes it 

 possible, should any pest attack it, to destroy the affected plants and 

 thus prevent the spread of the disease. During last year experiments 

 have been carried out to show the relative effect of different manures 

 on tapioca, the results of which will appear in a future report. An 

 investigation is being carried on in the scientific laboratories at Buiten- 

 zorg into the varieties of tapioca used in cultivation, and at the request 

 of Dr. Treub specimens were sent from Malaya to be examined and ex- 

 perimented with. 



Eubbee in Malaya. 



The rapid progress of the rubber industry in Malaya continued 

 during 1907, and at the end of that year 45,764 more acres of rubber 

 land had been planted, an increase of about 46 per cent on the total 

 of the previous year. The number of acres of planted rubber on the 

 31st December, 1907, being 179,227. The number of trees in 1906 

 was under 13,000,000, and in 1907 27,558,400, a large acreage being 

 planted closer than before. 



The output of dry rubber increased by 144 per cent ; 1907 show- 

 ing an export of 2,278,870 lbs., or 1,017 tons, as against 935,056 lbs., 

 or 417 tons, in the previous year. More than seven times the amount 

 of rubber was exported in 1907 than two years before in 1905. 



