Dec. 1906.] 



447 



Saps and Eoaudations. 



Furthermore, our experience of the growth of rubber plants in soils of 

 different kinds has taught us that in addition to alluvial banks there are soils 

 which, though they are perhaps of a poorer type, give satisfactory results, and 

 to-day even swampy patches which have never been known to be capable of yielding 

 paying crops before, are now growing excellent rubber trees ; swamps should, of 

 course, be well drained and otherwise properly treated. 



The climatic or soil conditions under which it has been proved that rubber 

 plants can be successfully cultivated in Ceylon, the Straits and India, have aroused 

 the interest of almost every institution in the tropical world, and it would be 

 idle to even wildly guess at the thousands of acres which could now be made to 

 grow rubber in the Malay Archipelago, Ceylon, the West Indies, Africa, and parts 

 of South and Central America. Rubber cultivation is now rapidly developing 

 into a science, better work is being done in planting operations, more care is being 

 exercised in eradicating pests as soon as they appear, and admirably skill is being 

 displayed by the producers in their efforts to place on the world's market the best 

 quality of rubber they can. 



THE OTHER SIDE. 



My remarks to you to-day may be regarded as very optimistic ; but it would 

 be difficult to be otherwise in the face of the work accomplished and the immediate 

 prospects before us. There are gloomy aspects to every industry, but those associat 

 ed with rubber cultivation are no more serious than those which face the tea, cacao, 

 coconut and other industries on which this and other countries have largely develop- 

 ed. We are told that our black pages are full of unpleasaut possibilities ; we have 

 to face the contention that though the consumption of rubber will probably increase 

 at a more rapid rate when prices are easier, yet at the same time the plantation 

 supply promises to increase at a rate which is sometimes alarming, and which 

 together with the impetus given to the collection of wild rubbers in African and 

 tropical American territories, may have an effect not in accordance with our desires. 

 The planting of quarter-million acres of rubber plants in a small fraction of the 

 Indo-Malayan region alone, within a few years, will show what canjbe done, and our 

 activity is not likely to be ignored in other parts of the world where rubber plants 

 can be grown, 



THE PLANTATION SUPPLY, 



When one reflects on the land already yielding or alienated for rubber in the 

 East, and considers its potentialities in relation to last year's consumption of, let us 

 say, in round numbers, about 60,000 tons of rubber and a future yearly increase of 

 about 5,000 tons per year, it is with surprise that one realises that there is a limit to 

 the extension in this particular cultivation. Consider for a moment what 60,000 tons 

 of wild i ubber (equal to 48,000 tons of pure rubber) represent ; assuming that, on 

 an estate, each tree yields only f lb. of rubber per year, and that there are 150 trees 

 to an acre, you have a means of providing one ton of pure rubber from every twenty 

 acres of land. Yet, about 60,000 or perhaps 68,000 tons of wild rubber were gathered 

 last year, a yield which will probably not diminish for many years, and one which 

 is the equivalent of 48,000 tons of pure plantation rubber or about nine hundred and 

 sixty thousand (960,000) acres of cultivated land. 



Our quarter-million acres of cultivated rubber land, on this modest basis of 

 150 trees per acre, and each tree yielding only f lb. of rubber, will give us 12,500 tons 

 of rubber, per year, in say five, six or seven years from now; it is therefore only 

 necessary to quadruple the present plantation rubber area in the Indo-Malayan region 

 alone, to subsequently supply the equivalent of the whole of last year's consumed 

 rubber. If you allow, as you may reasonably do, that the yield from cultivated 

 rubber trees will be 1£ lb. per tree, or 2 cwt. per acre, your future extension is further 

 reduced. Dr. Willis has already given you a warning based on an estimate of about 

 200 lb. of rubber per acre, per year, 



