RUBBER INDUSTRY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22543, 7 October 1936, Page 5

RUBBER INDUSTRY

PLANTATIONS IN MALAYA WOMAN'S UNUSUAL OCCUPATION An unusual occupation for a woman, that of managing a rubber plantation in Malaya, has claimed the attention of Airs. Richard Hughes, who is at present visiting New Zealand. Airs. Hughes said she had lived with the rubber industry practically all her life, as her father and her husband were both owners of large plantations. Recently, owing to her husband's ill health, she had undertaken most of the management of his plantation. British Alal ay a produced almost half tho total amount of the world's rubber last year, said Airs. Hughes. Rubber trees flourished practically anywhere in Malaya, on steep hillsides, coastal plains, among rocks, and in peat, although they thrived best on loam soils of good depth. The trees had few enemies, white ants, certain fungus diseases and storms being the most formidable. Cultivation consisted chiefly in keeping down weeds. In Alalava there was no change in the temperature irom day to day, though heavy afternoon thunderstorms were of almost daily occurrence. The humid heat, and heavy rainfalls, though enervating for human beings, provided the rubber tree with ideal conditions.

Tho Malays did not take kindly to regular work, said Airs. Hughes, and she had experienced some very real difficulties with them. Fortunately India, lying only a few days' journey to the west, possessed an inexhaustible supply of cheap, efficient labourers who flocked to the Malayan rubber plantations, where conditions were far better than in their own country. Before dawn the Indian coolies mustered at the factory for roll call and so quickly did they work that by 9 o'clock the sap in the rubber trees had ceased to run. By that time each of the coolies, called tapping coolies, would have dealt with about 300 trees. The plantations in Afalava averaged 2000 acres in size, but some were much larger.

The white people in Afalava lived in bungalows built of wood, most of the larger ones being in two storeys with deep eaves and wide verandahs to mitigate the heat which bv nine o'clock in the morning was like that of a hot summer afternoon in England. Most of the work about the house was done by Malay and Indian servants, who were most efficient when deftly supervised. Airs. Hughes had also many interesting facts to relate about the early struggles with the plantations, which not many years ago were dense virgin junsle, through which n path could be hacked only with difficulty. The jungle had to be cut down, burned, and cleared before the rubber seeds could be planted and then five years bad to elapse before the trees were considered old enough to be tapped.