Philippine Journal of Science 
1919 
The bark is used in Yoruba and Angola for making ropes, and 
also as a tying material in house building. When thoroughly 
cleaned the fiber is said to be fine, white, and a meter in 
length, and to take color well. It is strong and makes good 
cordage. Experiments have also been conducted to determine 
its suitability for use as a paper stock, and it was found to be 
almost twice as strong as Bank of England note pulp. In an- 
other place a sample of this fiber from India is reported as 
having uneven strength, apd as having a filament length of 
from 7 to 9 feet. This particular sample of fiber was of good 
spinning quality, and could be spun in conjunction with the 
finest grades of Calcutta jute. 
Numerous references are found in the literature regarding 
the use, cultivation, and extraction of Urena lobata bast, and 
its possibilities as a substitute for jute. The most extensive 
attempts to extract this fiber on a large scale (and at the same 
time the most costly and perhaps most disastrous) were made 
in Brazil where the bast is commonly known as “aramina.’' 
In this connection the British Consul at Santos, Brazil, reports : 
It was thought that a substitute for jute had been discovered in the 
aramina plant which grows wild, but under cultivation it lost a great 
part of the fibrous nature, and as the supply of the wild plant was wholly 
insuificient, a mill put up at a cost of some £24,000 [240,000 pesos] had to 
be shut down and after undergoing the necessary transformation is now 
used for the manufacture of hessians. 
Unfortunately the sample of rope procured at Dolores, Abra, 
as having been made of Urena lobata was made of a mixture of 
Corchorus olitorius (jute) and Urena lobata basts, in about equal 
proportions. Apparently the manufacturer discovered that he 
would not have enough of the latter fiber to make the length of 
rope ordered, and he, therefore, made up the deficiency by using 
Corchorus olitorius bast, which is plentiful in the region and 
which has properties similar to those possessed by Urena lobata. 
The strips of Urena lobata bast used in the rope were cream buff 
and averaged about 2 millimeters wide, 0.41 millimeter thick, 
and 1,118 millimeters long. The strips of Corchorus olitorius 
Agr. Bull. Straits & Fed. Malay States, IV, n. s. 6 (1905). 
™ Bull. Imp. Inst. 12 (1914) 34 and 35. 
“"Abbey and Yates, Agr. Ledger 15 (1908-09) 51-62. This paper 
gives some sixty references. 
“'Agr. Ledger 15 (1908-09) 57. [Apparently taken from the report 
of H. B. M. Consul at Santos, Brazil, appearing in the Board of Trade 
Journal 62 (1908) 91.] 
