RUBBER PRODUCTION

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 35, 10 August 1933, Page 9

RUBBER PRODUCTION

QUESTION PF RESTRICTION

"From recent speeches at rubber conn pany meetings I am glad to see th<» open and reasoned hostility' of somo. chairmen to any fresh scheme, of Government restriction," saia the Hon. E, D. Denman, M.P., at the annual meetine of the Badek Bubber Estate, Limited.- "Doubtless thero will always be speculators to whfon rumours of re-, strictions are as oases in a desert; and companies that ought to cease porduetion will be kept in activity by the artificial prices which result, : That such influences will favour the policy of restriction is, however, no evidence that it is for the permanent good of the industry. It is true that! as a. matter or theory no one in ttieso day's can object to the principle of deliberate and direct control of production to satisfy the needs of the market. To leave what should be a matter of intelligent planning to the crude play of supply and demand is rightly condemned, if other, courses are possible. Such conscious adjustment, however, implies Can industry, organised and unified as is only possibla in communities enjoying a strong administration. Even in the United States of America we see what '. difficulties have to be surmounted in attempts to control crop production. Whero an industry has not attained the stage of organisation, the price factor alone can be depended upon to act as the regulator of supply. It must be many years' before tho rubber industry1, can rise to the higher stage, ariS, meanwhile to apply to it methods appropriate only in the case of highly.organised ijx dustries is to commit the error of put* ting new wine into old bottles. That practice is admittedly injurious ; to all legitimate interests; though, undonbtedly, it is beneficial to bulls both of new wine and of old bottles. I am confident that if, in this matter, Government will leave the industry alone, its ow» business capacity will in duo time r»storo it to prosperity."