Liberian Rubber

For several years, Harvey S. Firestone, famed tiremaker, warned his countrymen of the dangers of a British rubber monopoly. Herbert C. Hoover took up the cry. But the public remained calm, and indifferent. Tires were still dirt-cheap, and Mr. Firestone's fulminations seemed visionary.

Then the British reduction of rubber output began to prove effective. Stocks of rubber in London warehouses have fallen from 52,000 tons in April, 1924, to about 5,000 tons today. Crude rubber has risen to 85c a pound--the highest price since 1917, and a rise of 68c (or 300%) in one year. America's millions of car owners are not smiling at Mr. Firestone's prophecies any more. They are thinking of higher tire prices in the future. Tire makers are already raising prices.

In the long run, as in the case of the Brazilian coffee monopoly, the rubber syndicate will probably defeat itself by encouraging tremendous new production, especially in the Dutch East Indies and the Para and Upper Amazon portions of Brazil. But it takes several years to bring rubber trees to bearing age, and meanwhile the British rubber growers will "sit pretty."

Mr. Firestone has not, however, remained idle. He has organized a mid-western group of important interests and has practically concluded negotiations for a large concession in Liberia, Africa, to locate new rubber plantations. Along with the concession, railways and roads would be built and the finances of the Liberian Government would be assisted for internal improvements. Liberia will, in fact, soon send a Loan Commission to Manhattan. Under the Liberian law, no white foreigner can own land--the result of a policy of "Africa for the Africans"--and the Firestone concession is said, therefore, to be based on a long-term lease.