AMERICA'S RUBBER SUPPLIES.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 47, 24 February 1923, Page 7

AMERICA'S RUBBER SUPPLIES.

■<£ . CONTROLLED FROM ABROAD. WASHINGTON, February 23. Mr. H. C. Hoover, Secretary of Commerce, informed the House of Representatives that the United States faces foreign monopolists' control of rubber, nitrates, salt, cocoanut. oil, and cocoa. He asked for an appropriation of ..00.000 dollars, on which the House Committee reported favourably, to enable investigation of the situation with a view to encouraging production of these products, especially rubber, in the United States possessions. Experiments conducted in the Philippines disclosed that rubber could be raised there profitably on a large commercial scale. - .A. and N.Z.i

The American proposals arc ilie outcome of strong feeling against the socalled Stevenson Act. which both limits the output and I'ontrols the price of the output of crude rubber from British plantations. The American manufacturers, says Mr. Ilines, one of the largest rubber manufacturers in America, have, of course, no right to interfere in a matter connected with British internal legislation. The opposition was based on exactly the same ground as that of the British rubber trade. The chief point, was that the amount of rubber which would be released under the Stevenson Ait in 1923 would fall seriously short of the world demand. The amount so released is estimated liv Mr. Hines to be not more than 27f1.0t10 tons. Against this the American manufacturers estimated that the total world consumption of rubber during the year would be from IJTo.OOO to 380.000 tons. The consumption in America alone was put at at least '275.00 ft tons. ••American manufacturers." he said, "hold that the Act is economically unsound and unwise Government interference with the sale and distribution of a vital raw product. The American manufacturers have had friendly trade relations with the British growers for fifteen years and have built up an enormous business, while enalilini; the rubber plantations to extend. During the recent crisis in prices every industry suffered, manufacturers Included, and we cannot understand \fc-hy the rubber producers should make a special demand for Government suonorT. and the maintenance of an artificial price in the market. '•Many American manufacturers have come to the conclusion that they must have greater control of the sources <>f supply of crude rubber. They think that the- rubber growers have shown unsound businesH judsment and the American manufacturers do not know what to expect in the. future. The Americans can only control the sources of supply by lookin? for sources other thin those ill the British plantations. The chief oneniiijf we see is in our own Philippine Islands, which are a* climatically suitable for rubber erowlnn as the British colonies in the Far F.a=t. Rubber is aTreadv grown there, and tile only thing which has prevented development has been the adequacy of the supply from the British plantations and the friendly relations we have always maintained with the British growers. •'There would need to be legislative change before th" Americans could grow rubber in sufficiently large quantities in the Philippines, and we realise tlmt it will take a number of years to build up the new source of supply. The manufacturing business in America is so great and is extending so rapidly that many manufacturers are confident that they could obtain the necessary support."