SAMOAN RUBBER.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 231, 30 September 1930, Page 17

SAMOAN RUBBER.

PLANTATION 'WORK STOPPED

LOW PRICES AND HIGH COSTS

Work on the rubber plantations in Samoa has been suspended pending a recovery of the market. The price i≤ now about 5d per lb, and it does not payto produce at that figure. A return of between 9d and 1/ a lb is needed before the New Zealand reparation estates can ! show a profit. ! This was the news brought to New Zealand by Mr. J. L. Hughes, who arrived on the Tofua. Mr. Hughes has spent live years in charge of the work on the" Government's rubber estates. The total area devoted to rubber production is about 3000 acres, and some 300 Chinese provide the labour. To each coolie about 1000 trees are allotted, and he receives payment according to the amount of rubber delivered to the factory. The rate was formerly 4d per lb of dry rubber, but this was reduced to 3d, j ami more recently to 2kl. A coolie can [attend to 500 trees a day. With 1000 ! trees allotted to each one this allowed an i eight-year period for bark growth, the I cutting on alternate days requiring half-an-inch of bark per month. Thus it takes eight years to work down each side of the tree, at the end of which time the bark will have been renewed, and the ' process can be begun afresh. In the old days the Samoan estates could not poduee rubber under 2/ per lb, but since Mr. Hughes went there the cost has been reduced to 7d on the Aleisa estate and more recently to 6Ad in the Central group. Rubber brought up to 2/6 a lb in the old days, and when Mr. Hughes went to Samoa the price was 2/. It has been falling steadily during the last IS months. During the last financial year the Aleisa estate produced 135,0001b of dry rubber, and the Central group 05.0001b. Solatia was recently leased to Chinese. Mr. Hughes has finished his work in Samoa, and is now on his return journey to England.