A NEW SOURCE OF RUBBER.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10760, 6 May 1911, Page 3 (Supplement)

A NEW SOURCE OF RUBBER.

When. Mackintosh started his -factory at Glasgow' iii ' 1823 fof® £he~ manufacture of the garment which now bears his name, the world produced 120 - tons'; of rubber per annum. In 1888,- when Dunlop brought but the pneumatio tyre, . this production had risen to 22,000. toiis a' year, and now it stands at more than 80,000 tons. '[No industry in the world," says an editorial writer in The Ilospital (London, March 4th), "has- shown such an example of-light-ning development." He goes on: "It is this fact tvhich gives a particular interest to a note of M. Jean Dybowski, professor of colonial agriculture at the National Agricultural Institute, recently presented to the Paris -Academy of Science relative to a newsource of production of rubber. - According to this note it is now possible to extract commercially from a gum called jelutong the 10 to 20 per cent; of rubber it contains. This gum is derived from a plant . . . found in large quantities in the Malay States, and .* - - can be obtained at a low

price in the principal European- markets, such as London. Antwerp, and Hamburg. Tho method of exti'actioh of tlie rubber is a very simple and comparatively easy process, and only takes three or four hours. On the- other hand, preparation costs little, and l3ie product can be sold at a price lower than obtains in the rubber market and still yield a handsome profit. A factory which has been started has already produced more than 60,0001b of rubber from this source which has been sold at a low price. Moreover, other companies have used the method described by M. Dybowski, and one of them with works in Russia counts on producing this year some 400,0001b of rubber extracted from this gum. Since the rubber so produced is of a higher quality than that obtained from the Congo, it seems probable that, thanks to this new source, the growing demand for rubber will be met without forcing up the price of the article to the height at which it has stood during the past year."