FIBRE AND HEMP INDUSTRY IN STRAITS 
SETTLEMENTS AND FEDERATED 
MiALAY STATES, 
By C. J. Schirmer. 
Singapore , igth June ryo^. 
The Editor, 
Jigricultural Bulletin , 
Straits Settlements and Federated Malay States. 
Dear SIR, — With reference to the conversations we had re Fibre 
and Hemp industry in the Straits and Federated Malay States, I take 
the liberty to give you on this subject my opinion, based on many 
years’ experience. 
Anyone who can obtain the necessary raw material would soon 
find this trade very profitable, as it justifies systematic cultivation 
on a big scale, when one considers the comparatively small outlay 
and the impossibility of obtaining sufficient quantities of the wild 
plant, but succeed in fibre cultivation in a country where this in- 
dustry is new and unknown to planters, and the produce unknown 
to nearly all merchants, the promoter must have patience, courage 
and a clear knowledge of the business and of what constitutes 
favourable circumstances. 
The first thing to make a fibre venture work and pay, is not, as is 
always believed, the mechanical decortication or rather the question 
of machinery, but, as stated above, to have sufficient and well cultiva- 
ted and conveniently situated raw material belonging to the factory, 
situated on a big fresh water river. The best position is the delta 
where the plantation should be made around the lactory (taking 
care to have the option of hinterland to extend the plantations if 
required). It should be easy and cheap from the nature of the 
situation and with the aid of proper means of transport, to carry the 
product at any moment to the factory, expenses of transport being 
reduced to the lowest possible cost. 
As leaves of fibre plants contain only between 1^-5 per cent, dry 
fibre, it will be seen that to make one ton of dry fibre the manufac- 
turer must have cut transport and work 20-66 tons of raw material ; 
on an average, if he works different sorts of fibres 40 tons, and as a 
rule, I say a factory should not be erected and not worked if it 
already exists, if it casinot obtain the raw material, delivered at the 
factory, at a cost not exceeding one-third of the daily European 
market price of the fibre intended to be manufactured. Say, for in- 
stance, to-day’s market price for Aloes is £30 per ton, 1/3 gives 
£10 or $iOO. As the return of Aloe is about 3 per cent, the manu- 
facturer requires for making one ton of dry Aloe fibre 33 tons of raw 
material which must not cost more than $100 or $3.33 per ton 
delivered at the factory. 
