BRITISH RUBBER CONTROL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18380, 21 April 1923, Page 7

BRITISH RUBBER CONTROL.

AMERICANS AROUSED. The recent ' increase- in. the '<■ price:. ; of rubber as a , result of what is \- :■'known.. as the ■:,■. Stevenson v. plan • to limit the rubber output in Malay a,* has, of ' course, excited the attention of American importers, .says the Spectator. ; America owns ■90 per cent, :of ; the; world's ; automobiles, and the rise in the price of rubber from 13 cents a. pound. v as ;it was in .1920, to 30 cents a pound, will cost the American users of tyres anything ;; between ■ £60,000,000, and;.: £120,000.000 annually. In America the.'..» increased ; price of = rubber ;is '■ naturally ' regarded with misgiving 'by every : owner of ■;: an i automobile there" are v eleven and a-half millions of them—while' in the British plantations in the East" the increased price has meant "salvation to ; many thous- • ands who were ; faced with bankruptcy. .",■ The Stevenspn plan, by a sliding scale of ': export taxes, restricts the production of •;■._ rubber under the British "flag to 60v.per cent, of the 1920 crop until ; the price r passes Is 3d a pound a series of adjust- '\ ments will permit of full production only '. when the price reaches 3». V . r ." The India Rubber Review ; of Akron, il Ohio, the world's greatest rubber manufacturing ; i centre,; regards y; the >.{>- British; policy as " utterly unsound and uneconomic," and warns the British Government that Brazil, which as ; lately as 1910 produced nine-tenths of the world's rubber Y and now produces only a fifteenth, ruined < her : rubber : ; industry by " export taxation and kindred : economic blunders." - But -it is not only the American press: which is concentrating on the lubber question- MrHenry Ford, the largest single consumer of rubber tyes. and;. Mr. Firestone, th« great, tyre manufacturer, are joining forces to break; the British control ;of crude rubber by developing the rubber possibilities of : the Philippines and of South America. ; The Akansas Gazette writes :— "Ever since the; rubber industry was started London has been the rubber capital of the world. With so] much of the producing end of the i business ■in' British hands, control of the ' rubber market naturally gravitated to the:;: British capital. London quotations control the rubber market all over the world, ; S It ■ is predicted - that this situation will?.be*, altered -and •■",' that New York or some ; other American city will become the : rubber p market of the world as the; result of .'< the' Ford-Fire-: stone enterprise. So .; extensive ■ a pro- - ; gramme will require time ,in J development, but American methods of mass productionV will be applied and the traditional Ameri- - ■ can hustle will be; employed. U With- these f forces turned loose, an :American-controlled ;, crude rubber . industry, free of 'any. British ; : or other : foreign restriction, ; may be re-; ; garded as in sight."