Description:
Essay about natural rubber extraction and commercialization during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Initially "the best source of latex, the milky fluid from which natural rubber products were made, was hevea brasiliensis, which grew predominantly in the Brazilian Amazon (but also in the Amazonian regions of Bolivia and Peru)." Later, Southeast Asian plantations developed a low-cost alternative to South American production methods. Includes graphs. By two history professors. |