and Magazine of the Ueylon Agricultural Society. 



485 



THE EASTERN RUBBER INDUSTRY. 



MR. HERBERT WRIGHT'S EXHIBITION 

 LECTURE. 



The text of the lecture by Mr Herbert Wright, 

 delivered at Rubber Exhibition on Wednesday, 

 16th Sept., was as follows : — 



A few month ago I had an opportunity of 

 visiting the islands of Ceylon, Java, and 

 Sumatra, and also of travelling through parts of 

 the Straits Settlements and federated Malay 

 States. The main objects of the tour were to 

 see what changes had recently occurred, in con- 

 nection with planting developments, to note the 

 methods adopted in cultivation and preparation, 

 and to determine the actual conditions of estates 

 in those areas. Apart from investigating points 

 of importance to planters in everyday life, I had 

 in view the fact that many rumours were current 

 to the effect that estates had been seriously 

 overtapped, that others had been allowed to be- 

 come smothered by weeds, and that some proper- 

 ties, in unhealthy districts, had been abandoned 

 on account of the prohibitive expense incurred 

 in managing them. In several cases the rumours 

 had some foundation, but after seeing thousands 

 of acres of all ages in the countries mentioned, 

 I could only conclude that many of us, in Lon- 

 don, and elsewhere, had been suffering from an 

 attack of "nerves" in the early part of the 

 year. Most managers in the East have now 

 learned to look forward to a selling price nearer 

 2s 6d than 6s per lb for their rubber; as they are 

 generally interested in their work and have their 

 own money at stake there appears to be little 

 reason to anticipate anything except economical 

 management in the future. When an industry, 

 like that of Eastern plantations, is in its in- 

 fancy, one may naturally expect new ideas and 

 inventions at every turn and that many brilliant 

 achievements as well as miserable failures will 

 be chronicled during the first ten years of its 

 existence. 



The Condition of Plantations. 



The details of my observations regarding the 

 condition of the estates have been given to you 

 elsewhere and I need only dwell upon the more 

 important points, viz., tapping methods, modes 

 of preparing rubber and the distances adopted 

 in planting in various countries. 



Tapping Operations. 

 First, let us deal with tapping. Phenomenal 

 yields of from 4 to 7 lb. per tree were recently 

 recorded from sections of well-known Malayan 

 estates and rumour had it that many trees had 

 Ween too vigorously tapped. True, the primary 

 bark had, in some instances, been excised far 

 too rapidly and tapping operations had neces- 

 sarily to be stopped on the trees so treated 

 , until a definite programme was formulated. 

 But they were the exceptions on the plan- 

 tations 1 visited. The fault appeared to lie 

 in the lack of organisation, no definite schemo 

 of removing the bark at specified periods and 

 rates having been adopted and no thought given 

 to the time required for the renewed bark to 

 mature. It should be remembered that the future 

 plantation yields must be obtained from the 

 socondary, tertiary, and subsequent renewed 



bark tissues ; what they will give we cannot de- 

 finitely say, especially from trees whare the bark 

 has been completely stripped in one year and the 

 available renewed bark is young and soft. 



From measurements and experiments made in 

 Ceylon and Malaya it was obvious that the 

 secondary bark often acquired a thickness equal 

 to that of the original or primary bark long bo- 

 fore the latex was sufficiently concentrated ; if 

 such bark is tapped a low percentage of rubber 

 will bo obtained therefrom, though the waste of 

 living cells will be large. An interval of three or 

 four years should be allowed on most estates be- 

 fore the secondary bark is tapped if permanency 

 in output is desired. Para rubber treescan thrive 

 under adverse conditions, but the treatment 

 meted out to them is often a very exacting one. 

 Very frequent tapping does not necessarily in- 

 crease the total yield ; and it should be remem- 

 bered that the longer the bark is allowed to 

 remain on the tree, within limits, the higher 

 will the percentage of caoutchouc be in the latex 

 and the more vigorously will the trees grow. 



Most estates are tapping on the half-herring 

 bone system, each area being tapped once every 

 alternate day. On a few plantations tapping 

 every day is indulged in ; and on a few others 

 the interval between successive operations is 

 longer than two days. I believe Dr Tromp de 

 Haas may now be able to give us the benefit of 

 his advice on this subject, as a result of 

 the tapping experiments he has been carrying 

 out at Buitenzorg, Java, but which were not 

 completed at the time of my visit. 



FUTURE y"lELD«. 



The yields of rubber obtained varied consider- 

 ably, but the average leads one to anticipate that 

 with careful tapping mature estates should give 

 something near 300 lb. of dry rubber per annum, 

 per acre. Many planters have already largely 

 exceeded that estimate, and even on closely- 

 planted estates 300 lb. per acre have been 

 obtained annually for each of the last few years. 

 Such a yield is in excess of that which 1 pre- 

 viously anticipated as the probable return, and, 

 if extensively realised, will materially affect 

 planters, investors and manufacturers in the not 

 very distant future. The subjects of tapping 

 and yields require to be seriously considered ; 

 in my opinion, too much thought cannot be 

 given to organisation of tapping operations, 

 training of tapping coolies, and perfecting the 

 implements used. A well thought out system 

 of tapping will save much trouble in the future. 



Consideration of this subject leads us on to 

 that of the means adopted in preparing raw 

 rubber from the latex obtained by tapping. 



Production of Robber from Latex. 



The production of dry rubber from latex in- 

 volves straining, coagulating, washing or rolling 

 and drying processes. On the majority of 

 Eastern estates the coagulation period extends ' 

 from the evening of one day to the morning of 

 the next ; washing is done in a few minutes ; 

 drying may take several weeks or even months. 



Vacuum driers are being taken up and success- 

 fully worked by planters who understand the 

 mechanism of the apparatus; by such means 

 drying is effected in a few hours instead of weeks. 



