CHAPTER I

Brazil, the land of rubber

[Illustration]

BRAZIL

THE

LAND _of_ RUBBER

AT THE

THIRD INTERNATIONAL RUBBER AND

ALLIED TRADES EXHIBITION

NEW YORK

1912

WITH THE COMPLIMENTS OF

THE BRAZILIAN GOVERNMENT

BRAZIL COURT

Brazil occupies no less than ten thousand square feet of space on the

Balcony Floor. The Exhibit is specially comprehensive. There is a fine

archway to each entrance to the court dominated by the arms of the

Federal Government. An Information Bureau is provided, at which all

enquiries as to Brazilian rubber will be answered. The walls are hung

with statistics and maps of the country. Close by are the offices of

the Brazilian Commissioners and a refreshment kiosk, where the Federal

Government dispenses Brazilian coffee to visitors. One of the first

things to strike the eye is the huge recumbent figure of the Rubber

Colossus, overlooking the mighty Amazon and its innumerable tributaries,

all of them highways of the rubber collecting industry. From this point

the visitor may, with the assistance of a number of pictures, 22 feet

by 12 feet, take a bird’s eye view tour up the Amazon. Alongside these

pictures is a unique collection from the different States of Brazil of

rubber and other products, the preponderance of the rubber industry being

illustrated by a fine pyramid of caoutchouc. Dotted here and there are

life-sized models of Brazilian workmen in their native costumes. Arriving

at the entrance to the Amazonas Section we find Dr. Pinto actually

engaged in the coagulation of latex by his new smokeless process, which

manufacturers have admitted turns out excellent rubber and which has the

great advantage over the native system hitherto in vogue, of saving an

enormous amount of both time and labor, whilst giving splendid results.

A second series of pictures affords a vivid idea of the salient features

of the State of Amazonas. In this section we have a mountain of rubber,

and a ball which weighs 1,600 pounds. There is a fine picture of a

native tapping a rubber tree and numerous very beautiful photographs.

That nothing may be wanting to the completeness of the representation of

Brazil’s great rubber industry a series of Moving Pictures is shown in

the Main Hall of the Exhibition, which visitors will find particularly

instructive after they have gone through the Brazilian Section on the

Balcony Floor.

[Illustration: MARECHAL HERMES DA FONSECA, President of Brazil.]

BRAZILIAN DELEGATION _of the_ INTERNATIONAL RUBBER EXHIBITION, NEW YORK

DISTRIBUTION OF SERVICE

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT COMMISSIONERS

_President_

DR. CANDIDO MENDES DE ALMEIDA

_Assistant_

MAIRO BAPTISTA NUNES

Official representation, information and publicity

_Vice-President_

ADMIRAL JOSÉ CARLOS DE CARVALHO

_Assistants_

DR. OSCAR SAYAO DE MORAES

ADALBERTO DE SOUSA ARANHA

Disposition of Exhibits, Decoration, Etc.

_General Secretary_

DR. EUGENIO DAHNE

_Assistant Secretary_

MR. DILLWYME M. HAZLETT

_Accountant_

MR. IVO GRACA CAMPOS

Reception of Exhibits, Correspondence, Purchasing,

Accounts, Payments, Etc.

STATE COMMISSIONERS

_State of Amazonas_

DR. MANOEL LOBATO

_Commercial Association of Amazonas_

MR. A. W. STEADMAN, New York Commercial Co.

MR. J. LEVY, Manáos

_State of Pará_

_Commercial Association of Pará_

MR. GEORGE E. PELL, General Rubber Co., New York

_State of Bahia_

J. DO ARGOLLO

_State of Minas Geraes_

DR. I. SANTIAGO CARDWELL QUINN

_Rubber Demonstration_

DR. CARLOS CERQUEIRA PINTO

OFFICE HOURS—9 to 12 A. M. and 2 to 5 P. M.

Committee Meeting of Delegation—Daily 3 to 4 P. M.

[Illustration: DR. PEDRO DE TOLEDO,

Minister of Agriculture of the Government of Brazil]

INTRODUCTION

Brazil, with its vast and immeasurable virgin forests in the valley

of the Amazon, undoubtedly the greatest in the world, traversed by

innumerable tributaries, many of which are larger and deeper than many of

the rivers in other countries, can be considered the largest storehouse

of native rubber of the best quality, all ready to be extracted,

coagulated and applied to all kinds of industries. No other investment of

capital can be as remunerative as that invested in the extraction of the

native rubber from full grown trees, already existing in large quantities

of many millions, and in zones full of natural richness.

For the culture of rubber trees of the various species, the whole

northern and central portions of Brazil are well adapted, and will give

magnificent results in the near future.

Nature has prodigally provided easy means of communication by waterways

broad and deep. The climate is equitable without great variations of

temperature, which gives perpetual summer and produces large and nearly

uninterrupted harvests of agricultural products.

The difficulties which hinder the rapid development of the extraction

of rubber are the obstructions in rivers in certain places, at certain

seasons of the year when the water is low, and the fact that the

production of rubber is so remunerative that all the vigorous men that

are thus engaged do not care to engage in any other industry. Thus it is

that living in the rubber regions is very expensive because everything

must be brought there, even implements and foodstuffs.

These difficulties, however, have been brought to the attention of the

Federal Government of Brazil, and of the States, and in consequence

an important Congress was called and presided over by the Minister of

Agriculture, Industry and Commerce. The Legislative power also passed

special laws providing measures urgently needed to better the existing

conditions. These laws also provide for a department under the Minister

of Agriculture, Industry and Commerce, to be called “The Protection of

Rubber,” which has already been formed and is at work.

Among the various and important provisions of the law, is the

establishment of various experimental stations for advancing the

cultivation of the four different kinds of rubber trees found in Brazil,

the Hevea braziliensis (seringa), castillôa (caucho), maniçoba, and

mangabeira. These trees are all natives of Brazil and can be cultivated

from the upper regions of the Amazon to the States of S. Paulo and

Paraná. That is, from the extreme north to nearly the extreme south, one

or other of these species can be cultivated, according to the climate and

character of the soil in each region.

Various concessions and money premiums are offered to attract capital

and awaken activity in this industry. Certain services, such as the

establishment of hospitals, medical attention and hygienic regulations

are also provided by the Federal Government.

In the pages of this book will be found, fully treated, the principal

points of this important subject. From the statistical tables published

and from the exhibits displayed at the International Rubber Exposition in

New York, it can readily be seen that the rubber of Brazil is judged the

best in the world, and that its production although already enormous is

destined to be largely increased.

DR. CANDIDO MENDES DE ALMEIDA,

President Brazilian Commission.

A MONOGRAPH UPON PARÁ RUBBER

HISTORICAL NOTES ABOUT PARÁ RUBBER

It is in our diaries of the voyage of the Genovese Columbus, that among

the important occurrences of that notable crossing of the ocean, which

gave him immortality, appeared the first references, made by Herrera, to

the quality of a certain gum utilized by the aborigines.

In 1536 Gonçalvo Fernandes d’Oviedo in his “Universal History of

the Indies,” published in Madrid, also mentioned the uses which the

indigenous tribes of North America made of rubber skins in their

amusements.

The Jesuit Charlevoix also refers to it and more fully yet does John

Torquemada who in his “Indian Monarchy,” expresses himself thus: “There

is a tree in this country (Mexico) known to the natives as =ulequahuitl=,

to whom it is of the greatest value. This tree grows in the warm or

torrid zone; and presents itself of a medium height with rounded leaves

of an ashy color. It furnishes in abundance a species of glutinous white

liquid like milk, which makes it of great utility to them.

“The milk of the =ulequahuitl= is obtained by beating the tree with a

small hatchet. The liquid is then seen to ooze out from the incision made

like blood from a wound. The natives gather it into dry hollow gourds of

various sizes. It gradually takes consistency in these receptacles, until

it turns into a gummy mass, from which it is easy to adapt it to any form

which may be required.

“Those who have no gourds, besmear their bodies with the liquid

substance, as it flows out from the tree; which in drying forms itself

into a species of membrane, which is easily taken off and whose thickness

varies according to the coating spread over the skin. Skins very

much appreciated for their elasticity are made with this =ulli=. The

ulli solidified serves for shields, which thus are proof against the

sharpest-pointed arrows, owing without doubt to the pliability of the

material, which does not affect its tenacity.

“Kings and nobles habitually use shoes made of ulli. The Spaniards of

Mexico, moreover, impregnate their capes with =ulli=, so as to make them

water-proof, because it is proved that such substance resists water in a

marvelous manner, but melts before the action of the sun.”

[Illustration: COUNT CANDIDO MENDES DE ALMEIDA,

President of the Federal Government of Brazil Commission.]

In Mexico and Central America, the name of =Ule= still denotes even

to-day one of the rubber trees known as the elastic Castille.

After the Spaniards, the French in 1736 occupied themselves with that

substance, whose interesting properties had not up to that date come to

deserve the attention of the Europeans.

De la Condamine sent by the French Government to Perú, in order to

measure a degree of the terrestrial meridian, was the first to refer

to the Hevea of the Guyana. In a note that accompanied a small sample

of resinous gum of a heavy dark color, almost black, he said to the

Academy of Sciences: “There grows in the forests of the province of the

Esmeraldas a tree known to the natives by the name of Hevé; a white

resinous liquid something like milk runs out from it after making an

incision; this substance is collected in a leaf that is laid close to the

foot of the tree and afterwards is exposed to the sun, when it gets black

at first upon its surface and afterwards by continuous exposure to the

sun becomes black in all its mass. Torches, which burn admirably well,

are made from it. It is known in Quito, that that tree grows also upon

the banks of the Amazon and that the Mainas call it cautchú. They make

earthen moulds in the form of bottles and cover them with that material.

Afterwards when the resin gets hard, they break the mould and thereby

obtain unbreakable water-jars much lighter than glass bottles.”

Later on he wrote: “many are the uses which the Omaguas make of that

resin in the central parts of South America, especially among the Indians

of Pará where the Portuguese gave to the tree that produces it, the name

of =Pauseringa=, because from it ‘seringas,’ much in vogue among the

Omaguas, are manufactured; these being little hollow balloons in the

shape of a pear, into which a tube is inserted.

“In Pará it is moulded in still many different manners, they make

=borracha=, faces of animals, hollow or solid balls and also apply it in

the manufacture of boots which become quite water-proof and when smoked

acquire the appearance of leather.”

Fresneau, a collaborator of de la Condamine, sought to study the

vegetable plants which produced that gum, obtaining as a result that

Aublet, a French botanist, proceeded to interest himself in the question

and completed de la Condamine’s studies, and then classifying the hevé

under the domination of =Hevea Guyanensis=.

It was only in 1798 that the =Ficus elastica=, the first Asiatic plant

producer of rubber became known, and up till 1860 South America, English

India and Java were the only rubber-producing countries in the world.

[Illustration: ADMIRAL JOSÉ CARLOS DE CARVALHO,

Vice-President of the Federal Government of Brazil Commission.]

Much later than this—in 1885, Africa commenced to export this article, an

industry which reached its apogee after the creation by Leopold II of the

Independent State of the Congo.

In the meantime, in spite of the fact of some of the qualities of rubber

and even its applications being known in Europe ever since the Sixteenth

Century, it was only during the Nineteenth Century, that this product

conquered that position as an article very much in evidence which it now

occupies as an indispensable material in modern industry or even still

yet for the necessities which civilization created.

Hérissant and Macquer, in 1768, discovered the first dissolving

processes; in 1770, Priestley vulgarized the property of the “borracha”

in wiping out lead-pencil tracings from which the English name =Rubber=

is derived; Berniard, Fourcroy, Berthollet, Grossart and others occupied

themselves about this commodity, with more or less success. Madier,

in 1820, found out a mechanical means of cutting the rubber-blocks in

order to obtain elastic threads and three years afterwards, MacIntosh

discovered that naphtha dissolved rubber and thus made cloth impervious

to the action of water.

The adaption of rubber to industrial purposes such as the manufacture of

shoes, physical and surgical appliances, elastic cloths, railway-buffers,

machine-springs, etc., was fairly in full swing when the discovery of the

vulcanizing of rubber by Goodyear sprung up, an occurrence which came to

revolutionize the incipient industry and enormously enlarge the scope of

the commercial application of that product, which thence forward came to

assume exceptional importance. The vulcanizing method consists in the

mixing of a certain quantity of rubber with sulphur and in the exposure

of that mixture to an elevated temperature and to a high pressure during

a certain space of time. The rubber transforms itself considerably; the

property of indefinite hardness is lost, but presents greater resistency

to the forces of compression and lengthening-out, supports excessively

low temperature and becomes less sensible to the action of ordinary

dissolving ingredients.

In Brazil already existed up to 1840, a rudimentary industry of shoe

manufacturing and in the water-proofing of various objects. The great

demand for rubber caused by the development of the industry in foreign

countries and consequently the very high profits that the extraction of

rubber in the Brazilian “seringaes” or native rubber-forests presented,

destroyed all that initiative and Brazil passed into the position of

a mere producer of the raw material. In order to appreciate with what

devotion the country lent itself to this occupation, sufficient is it to

contrast the 31 tons exported in 1827 with the 36,547 exported in 1911.

[Illustration: DR. EUGENIO DAHNE,

General Secretary of the Federal Government of Brazil Commission.]

RUBBER-PRODUCING PLANTS—BOTANICAL DESCRIPTION—PRODUCTIVENESS—REGIONS IN

WHICH THEY EXIST

At the present moment, more than 300 species of rubber-producing plants

are known to exist, these being distributed among the tropical regions

of the world. Trees of large size, climbing plants and flexible creepers

containing the precious latex in their branches, trunk and roots, those

vegetable growths from the double point view of quantity and quality

of rubber produce have not an equal importance. The species worthy of

mention belong to four great families:

1.—Euphorbiacan, =Hevea=, =Micrandra=, =Manioh=. 2.—Ulmacean, =Castillôa=

and =Ficus=. 3.—Apocynacean, =Landolphia=, =Hancornia=, =Kickxia=,

=Carpodium= and =Clitandra=. 4.—Asclepiadaceas, =Callotropia=,

=Cynanchum=.

The production of rubber in America is principally furnished by the

heveas, micandra, manioh, castillôa and hancornia; that of Asia by the

ficus; and that of Africa by the landolphia, clitandra and kickxia.

In the Amazonian region of Brazil, there exist about 21 species of

heveas; of these the principal is the hevea braziliensis, which under

the name of “the Pará rubber-tree” deserves to be classed in the front

rank of all the other lactiferous plants in the world. The =hevea

braziliensis= furnishes the most highly esteemed quality of rubber, and

it is the value of that product which determines the prices of all the

other species of rubber brought on to the market.

The heveas are powerful trees of from 20 to 30 metres high, the trunk

which is cylindric in form and of a light ashy color, generally attains

a diameter of from 0ᵐ80 to 1ᵐ20; the branches only commence to grow

at about 15 metres from the ground. The leaves fall in June, but are

speedily substituted by others; it is during this period that the trees

break into flower.

They grow in the valley of the Amazon, which within Brazil embraces the

State of the Amazonas, the federal territory of Acre, almost all the

State of Pará, the North of Matto Grosso and of Goyaz and a part of the

South of Maranhão, or say about 5,000,000 of square kilometres.

Their =habitat= as a general rule is a low and warm region whose

temperature varies between 25° and 30°; without sudden changes during

the course of the year and they favor by preference the watery soils,

just swampy, damp and even marshy; however, at the head-waters of some

rivers, they also live and develop themselves perfectly well in dry and

elevated land. In the Amazonic forests, the average proportion is of one

hevea-tree for 80 trees of other species.

The milky latex circulates from the root to the leaves, existing,

however, in greater abundancy in the trunk, up to a height of about 2

metres from the ground. The heveas in Brazil are generally known by

the term “seringueiras” and the forests in which they are found are

denominated “seringaes.”

The average production of a “seringueira” during the harvest season,

which extends over the space of 6 months, is of 5 kilos of fine rubber

and 750 grs. of sernamby.

The species most appreciated besides the =hevea braziliensis=, are the

=hevea de terra firme=, of which Dr. E. Ule treats in his recent studies,

and which are found on the frontiers of Matto Grosso, the =hevea do

Rio Negro=, called “seringa verdadeira” (the real seringa), the =hevea

benthamiana= and the =hevea dukei=, =Hub=, from the region of the Japurá,

all of them furnishing excellent products.

In the valley of the Amazon exist the =micandras=, belonging to the same

family and producing a rubber of a superior quality, since it is sold

under the name of Fine-Pará. The production of these trees goes to the

market included in the category of hevea, owing to its similarity to

this latter. The =micandra syshenoide= which is the most known species,

is found on the Lower Amazon, in the innumerable islands at the estuary

of the great Amazon River, in the valleys of the Madeira, the Solimões,

the Japurá and the Purús; the natives give it the names of =tapurú=,

=curupita=, =murupita= and =seringarana=. They are leafy trees whose

trunk is of from 0ᵐ80 to 1ᵐ in diametre and from 20 to 25 metres high.

They grow as well in the low lying marshy soil as in the elevated lands,

whence comes their denomination of =tapurú da vargem= and =tapurú de

terra firme=. The tapurú is as lactescent or milky as the hevea and the

latex which it renders is equally rich, seeing that it gives 50 per cent

of fine rubber.

The trees whose product, the =caucho=, occupies the second place in the

general exportation of rubber from Brazil although as a matter of fact

it only commenced to come into the Brazilian markets in the year 1896,

belong to the family of the Ulmaceas. These are the =Castillas= which up

till a short time ago have been classed as of the same species as that

which grows in Mexico and Central America—the Castilla elastica, but

studies made by professor O. Warburg show that they are distinct species

which was thence forward denominated =Castilla Ulei, Warb.=

The “castillôa” is a tree of large proportions, reaching to a height of

from 12 to 18 metres; its trunk with a diametre of from 0ᵐ60 to 0ᵐ90,

is of an ashy gray color, smooth and sparingly branched. The leaves are

large, greater, indeed, on the new plants than on the full grown trees

and its fruit is of an oily nature.

These trees grow in considerable quantities at the sources or head-waters

of the affluents of the Amazon on the latter’s right bank, such as the

Juruá, the Purús, the Madeira, the Tapajóz and the Xingú, and on its

left bank in the valleys of the Japurá, the Iça, the Rio Negro and the

Trombetas Rivers. Abundant “cauchaes” or forests of cautchou trees exist

also in the region of the River Tocantins and of the Araguaya.

The “castillôa” is found therefore in the same regions as those in which

the “seringueiras” flourish; it exacts a warm climate, a clayey or

clayey-silicious soil, but does not thrive in swampy ground or such as is

easily inundated during the rainy season.

The latex is found as much in the bark as in the alburno and each tree

felled produces on an average about 50 litres of latex or say from 18 to

20 kilos of rubber.

“Ceará” is the mundial denomination of another quality of Brazilian

rubber, the rubber of the =Maniçoba= tree. The maniçoba =manihot

glaziovii= is a handsome tree 10 to 15 metres high, and a native of the

Northeastern region of Brazil. Its trunk presents a diametre of from 20

to 50 centimetres and it possesses few branches; its wood-fibres are weak

and light. The cortex, which possesses lactiferous vessels in abundance,

is protected by a silicose layer, easily removable. It is a plant of

rapid growth.

According to a classification made by Dr. Ule, there are four species

of manioh, the =m. glaziovii=, the =m. piauhyensis=, the =m. dichotoma=

and the =m. heptaphylla=, the which exist almost throughout all Central

Brazil, being specially abundant in Ceará, Piauhy and Bahia.

Little exigent, it thrives in regions where the temperature oscillates

between 22° and 36°, on low-lying ground and it develops itself well in

lands of great altitude, in which the thermometric average temperature is

about 15°, resisting even the hoar-frost.

It is indifferent to this tree whether the climate be damp or dry, as

long as the soil is dry.

The species most appreciated are those from Piauhy and the Jequié

(“sertão” or back-woods of Bahia). Those of Piauhy present two varieties:

the white and the black species, the white being the most renowned. They

are of small size, with abundant foliage and thick bark and darkish stem

and give plenty of the milky latex, the average being 1,200 grammes per

tree. Those of the Jequié, which grow between the rivers Paraguassú to

the north and of the Contas to the south, are a shrub-tree whose trunk

does not exceed 30 centimetres in diametre. The bark is fine and of light

clear color; it produces about 500 grammes of rubber.

The mangabeira (Hancornia speciosa) is a slender and crooked shrub-tree,

3 to 4 metres high, and abounds on the high-lying table-lands or plateaux

in the interior of Brazil. The trunk has a diameter of from 0ᵐ30 to 0ᵐ35;

is scantily leaved; the fruit is eatable and has a very agreeable taste.

A plant of an extraordinary resisting power, it defies the inclemency

of the climate, the absence of rains, the scarcity of humidity and of

nourishment from the soil. It predominates in the =catingas= of the

Northern States, in the =carrascaes= of Goyaz and in the =cerrados=

of S. Paulo, which means to say, that it is found from Maranhão to S.

Paulo, now in the Interior, as in the mountain-range of the Mangabeiras

between Maranhão and Goyaz, in the central Chapada of Minas, in the

Parecis of Matto Grosso and in S. Paulo in the zone comprised between the

Paranápanema River and the Rio Grande, tributaries of the Paraná River,

and again on the littoral, which is the case from Bahia northwards as far

as Ceará.

There are several different varieties of this plant, there being no

indications, however, tending to point out any one of these preferable

to another with regard to the question of its yield. The latex is of a

bluish tint, its richness in rubber varying greatly. Each mangabeira

supplies on an average one kilogram of rubber.

Besides the plants mentioned, there are still many others in Brazil which

furnish rubber, but which continue to grow without being taken advantage

of, on account of the little profit they give.

To speak only of those which exploited on a small scale have yet supplied

the Brazilian markets with an appreciable product, we may yet mention

the =Massaranduba=, =Mimosups elata=, and =Frei-Allem=, gigantic trees

found from the Amazon and Pará to Rio de Janeiro and Minas, abundant in

the milky latex, which being coagulated produces a rubber very similar to

gutta-percha, to which it serves as a substitute in all the latter’s most

important applications; and the =Sorva=, =Couma utilis=, =Muell. Arg.=,

which grow in Pará and in the Amazon valley, the latex of which, the

=leite de sorva=, enters, with a small coefficient into the production of

rubber in these two States.

EXTRACTION OF RUBBER, METHODS AND PROCESSES

The great organic and biologic differences which exist between

rubber-trees, exact divers processes of preparation in order to obtain a

complete utilization of the productive capacity of each.

It is, however, interesting before entering into a description of the

different processes adopted in Brazil, to here state what the chemists

think as to what rubber really is.

Rubber is a carburate of hydrogen which in the shape of white globules

more or less elongated, are found suspended in the milky latex. The

composition of those globules, although even yet, badly defined, is

represented by the formula (C¹⁰ H¹⁶)ⁿ. Rubber is generally considered

as a derivative of the Isoprina, into which it transforms itself when

submitted to the action of dry heat, as Bouchardat demonstrated by his

experiments in 1879. Treating the isoprina in a strong solution of

chloridic acid, an interesting body is obtained, which reminds one of

rubber on account of its elastic properties. Wallach, Tilden, Weber,

Harries and others gave themselves up to accurate studies upon the

composition of rubber; nevertheless, up till to-day, however, no definite

result has as yet been arrived at.

The latex, a thick liquid which has the appearance of animal milk,

circulates in special vessels, distributed diversely in the organism of

certain plants.

The following are the results of the analysis obtained from the latex of

the =hevea braziliensis= by Seelingmann, Scott and Bamber:

Seelingmann Scott Bamber

Water 55 a 56% 22 - 32% 55¹⁵ - 55⁵⁶%

Rubber 32% 37 - 13% 41²⁹ - 32 %

Proteine 2% to 3% 2⁷¹% 2¹⁸ - 2⁰³%

Resin traces 3⁴⁴% - 2⁰³%

Ash 0²³% - 0⁴¹%

Sugar 4¹⁷% - 0³⁶%

Oily substances 9⁷% traces -

Specific weight: Seelingmann, 1.019. Bamber: 1.018.

It is advisable to note, that the proportion of water may vary a great

deal, influenced sometimes by the season being either wet or dry, and at

other times by the weakness or vigor of the tree at the occasion of its

being tapped.

The quantities of proteine, resin and ash are dependent on the chemical

composition of the soil, those quantities affect the quality of the

rubber, which is the more elastic, resistent and durable the smaller the

proportion of those elements.

In the coagulation of the latex, the resin incorporates itself in

the rubber, it becoming difficult to separate it, which, however,

is necessary; the proteine or albuminous matter is the cause of the

developing of the bacteria which occasion the putrefaction of the

manufactured article.

The method employed in Brazil in the extraction of the latex and in the

preparation of rubber from the heveas trees, is the same as that which

was taught by the natives and it is a remarkable thing, that due to the

excellency of the product resulting therefrom, it is considered even

to-day as the best system.

The great production of rubber in Brazil, is due to the exploitation

of the natural seringaes. A “seringal” or, better said “seringaes” in

the plural sense, are the forests where the hevea trees flourish among

other numerous specimens of luxuriant vegetation, and in those regions

everybody, i.e., all the able-bodied men, occupy themselves with the

extraction of rubber and are known as “seringueiros.”

In order to exploit the “seringal,” operations are commenced by the

construction on the bank of the river, at a place easy of access for

navigation, of a large rustic edifice with out-buildings and various

sheds. The general edifice serves as a dwelling-place for the owner or

his representative and includes a general store or shop with a tavern

which does business in selling all the necessary articles required in

or connected with the life of exploiting the “seringal,” a store-house

for depositing the rubber and an office or counting-house. The sheds are

the rudimentary habitation-huts of the “seringueiros” and are sometimes

constructed in the interior of the forests, so as to facilitate to a

greater degree the work which they have in hand.

As soon as the forest is explored and the seringueiras discovered,

=estrades= are opened, these being winding roads cut in the undergrowth

and brush-wood with the “facão” (a species of large pruning-knife) and

these roads connect a 100 or 150 rubber trees and they lead back to

their original starting point. At sunrise, that is to say, at 6 o’clock

in the morning, the seringueiro armed with a “terçado” a sort of spear,

a fowling-piece or sporting-gun, a small axe or hatchet, a pail and a

large number of “tigelinhas,” commences his work. The hatchet is the

instrument employed for tapping the trees; it takes the form of a common

pole-axe, being, however, generally of cast iron and with the edge of

the blade blunt rather than sharp, and from 3 to 4 centimetres broad.

The tigelinhas are small vessels or cups of tin-plate with a capacity of

about one hundred grammes and of a conical shape cut off at the top.

The seringueiro commences by striking the trees with the hatchet, whose

handle is about a metre long, which permits of his making incisions at

about from 3 to 3½ metres from the ground. That operation has for its

object to make the latex ascend from the roots; the milk that oozes out

is utilized as “sernamby.” Two days afterwards, the regular extraction

commences, a hatchet with a shorter handle being then used.

To bring this extraction about, “seringueiro” makes the first incision

at two metres from the ground, but those incisions must not pierce the

cambium and the wood and are as a general rule made at an inclination

of 25°. At the lower part of the incisions made by the blows, the

“tigelinhas” are fixed, whose sharp and cutting corner penetrates easily

into the bark of the tree. The seringueiro operates thus upon all the

trees of his road, and this work which occupies him about from 2 to 3

hours being completed, he takes the pail capable of holding 10 litres and

recommences his round, gathering into that receptacle the milk contained

in the tapping cups, which now empty are boxed one into the other and

deposited close to the trunk of each tree.

After that second round and in order that the milk shall not become

deteriorated, commences the most delicate operation, that of the smoking

process.

For that operation, the seringueiro is supplied with a “boião,” a kind of

earthen funnel-shaped chimney, a form made like a spatula or putty-knife

and a kind of basin “cuia,” like a dry gourd, made from the half of the

fruit of the cabaceiro (crescencia cuyeté).

The fire made with blocks of urucury (Ataléa speciosa Martius) or with

fire-wood of massaranduba, rich in oily substances, being kindled, the

seringueiro places the “boião” upon it, the function of this latter being

to canalize the smoke so that it escapes at the top, which is open.

Through the loop of a cord hanging near to the “boião” the form is passed

and sustained by the “seringueiro” who gives it a gyratory movement;

with the “cuya” or gourd, he pours the latex into the part scooped out

of the spatula, which he carries off immediately to the smoke. The latex

thickens and forming a thin skin upon the which another coating of latex

is poured out, which is also passed to the smoke. Those successive and

alternate operations form the skins, large balls of rubber, weighing from

20 to 60 kilos, which are the type exported from Brazil. The smoke acting

as a solidifyer and at the same time a disinfectant by the presence

of creosote, acetic acid, etc., kills all the bacteria that produce

putrefaction and hastens by its heat the evaporation of the water.

The rubber thus formed is of a superior quality, but when, however, the

curds still deposited in the basin, are incorporated with it, the quality

becomes damaged, being then quoted as medium fine. The portion of milk

which remains adhering to the receptacle or which surrounds the boião and

which thickens freely, is reunited into one single skin, and constitutes

the “sernamby.”

On the following day the work recommences, the seringueiro making new

incisions about 7 centimetres below the first, and continuing thus until

he reaches the ground.

To that series of blows in the vertical sense, 35 on the average, is

given the name arreação. In each seringueira 2 of these arreações can be

made per year.

That process which with small variations is employed in all Amazonia,

produces, as is known, the best rubber in the world. A seringal

may contain in accordance with its size from 40 to 800 roads. Each

seringueiro exploits 2 roads; in which he works alternatively. The

daily gathering varies between 2 and 8 litres of milk, but an average

of 5 litres can be taken for a road which contains 120 seringueiras

of 35 centimetres diametre. As each arreação has 35 incisions and the

seringueiras supporting 2 “arreações,” we have thus for each road 70 days

or 140 days for the 2 roads; 700 litres of milk produce 400 kilos or in

other words 1.666 grammes per tree.

There are “seringaes,” however, in which that average is considerably

greater, a medium of 3 kilos per tree not being an exaggeration in some

rivers.

Contrary to the almost sedentary life of the seringueiros, the extractors

of the caucho (known as caucheiros) are of nomadic habits, and this is so

by reason of the barbarous process employed in the exploitation of those

trees which is a ruinous one.

The extraction of the latex of the “castillôa” can be done in the same

way as that of the latex of the heveas; the caucheiros allege, however,

that the cupim introducing itself into the wounds made by the incisions

soon causes the death of the plant. Thus they argue that if the tree is

condemned, the best way is to cut it down so as to obtain the greatest

benefit possible out of it, by the complete utilization of the latex

which each tree contains. That reasoning, however, has no foundation in

fact.

* * * * *

The exploitation of the castillôa is done in the following manner: the

“caucheiro” penetrates into the forest and marks each castillôa tree that

he finds, with a cut from his knife, which incisions correspond to a sign

of possession for extraction later on. Once he has discovered a certain

number of these trees, he constructs a temporary wooden hut for himself

and then begins his work. In the first place he clears the brush-wood

around each tree and cleans away the undergrowth from the ground, he then

opens small cavities in the lower part of the trunk into which he fixes

the “porringers,” small vessels made of tin, which are to receive the

latex. This done he strikes the tree with oblique “entalhas” of from 1

to 1½ metres in length, canalizing the latex which commences to run from

the extensive wounds, by means of mud gutters. At the end of 24 hours the

little tin vessels are full and their contents are then all poured into a

pail, the “caucheiro” commencing thereafter to cut down the tree, so as

to get the full benefit of the latex, existing in the superior part of

its trunk. The tree as a general rule is cut at a point above that where

the incisions were made, the tree thus remaining suspended above the

ground at one end by the lower part of the trunk, where it remains fixed

and at the other by its own branches. Along the whole length of the trunk

at about a distance of an arm’s length from each other, new circular

incisions are made and in corresponding cavities on the ground are placed

the receiving cups. The latex thus gathered is collected into a pail.

The thickening is done with a solution of common soap about 125 grammes

to a pail of water, two pailfuls of that solution being necessary to

thicken 30 litres of latex. They also employ the juice of a liane

called =vetilla= which by the description given seems to belong to the

convolvulas family—the =Ipomea patatas=.

The thickening process takes place in rectangular holes of 1 metre long

and half a metre broad, whose clayey sides are well paved and into them

the latex is poured, care being taken that it is then covered up with

palm leaves to prevent the entry of rain water. They thus obtain the

caucho planks (rubber in cakes), which arrive in the market full of

impurities, that depreciate its value very much and it is not at all a

rare thing that water exists in cavities in the interior of it, thereby

increasing the weight and making the transport dearer.

The portions of the latex which flow out along the length of the trunk or

fall into the cavities after that the cups have been taken away, thicken

itself freely and form the “sernamby” of caucho, to-day much appreciated

in the rubber markets, because of its being purer and not offering errors

in weight.

Each adult tree furnishes on the average from 50 to 56 litres of latex

or in other words nearly 30 kilos of rubber. Each cake of the size above

mentioned weighs nearly 60 kilos; it is thus necessary to cut down three

trees so as to obtain one cake.

The trees cut down sprout and commence to grow again, but eight years

are necessary to elapse before they can be exploited anew.

No accord has so far been established as to the best methods of

extraction to be employed for the different species of maniçoba, nor as

to the period most appropriate, the duration of the tapping or the yield

of the wild trees or planted trees of different ages.

The system adopted for the natural maniçoba, consisting in the tapping

of the subterranean organs, has been applied to cultivated maniçoba; the

incisions are made in a transversal sense and have the form of a V with

the angle more or less rounded.

The latex is gathered in the ground, at the bottom of a small cavity,

opened up on the occasion of the discovery of the parts destined to be

tapped; as a rule the worker covers the bottom of the cavity with a coat

of clay in powder, in order to prevent the penetration of the latex and

its mixing with the sandy soil; the employment of tigelinhas is desirable

or of pots of glazed clay, refractory to rust.

The latex thickens during the day, forming a sort of flat ball or

biscuit of rubber, which goes on augmenting as the tapping process is

multiplied. At the end of a week the rubber which has been obtained, is

gathered together and washed in cold water, with a view of eliminating

the remains of the serum and other impurities. This method, although

primitive, permits of the production of pure rubber. The trunks and

branches of the maniçoba are also cut; however, such system occasions

great inconvenience. The extensive flaws heal up with difficulty, as the

bark of the tree is relatively thin the lactiferous vessels are located

in the deep layers; it is not a rare thing that the death of the tree

is caused thereby or that the attack of rodent insects or mushrooms is

thereby facilitated. It may be of importance to note, that the incisions

made simultaneously on the trunk, the branches and the underground parts,

speedily exhaust the maniçobeiras; and so the system of an alternate

cutting is preferable.

The tappings are practiced during the first six months of the year and

extend themselves over a period of from 50 to 60 days. Owing to the lack

of data, the average yield of production, which varies according to the

age of the trees, cannot be determined, however, the average production

of the planted maniçobas may under reserve, be calculated to reach during

the space of 60 days 120, 180, 240, and 300 grammes per tree of 2, 3, 4

and 5 years respectively, in accordance with a calculation made by Dr. L.

Zehnter.

The actual cost price in the plantations does not exceed 1$500 per kilo,

and might be reduced through an improvement in the systems employed;

the cost price of rubber from the native maniçoba is higher, due to the

dearness of labor and of freights.

* * * * *

There is so far no process which may be called the best for extracting

rubber from the mangabeira; the process in use varies with the region,

all of them, however, leading to the complete extinction of the plant.

Under the pretext of the cupim destroying the plant, attacking the

incisions that have been made, the latex is usually extracted at a small

height from the ground. In the “sertões” or wild woodlands of Bahia,

Pernambuco and Parahyba, the extraction is done by making a spiral

cutting from the thickest branches to the ground, where the cavity is

made for receiving the latex.

Nevertheless, the incisions with the cup attached is now being employed,

in the same manner as is customary with the seringueira; for that

purpose, the exploiters make horizontal incisions or in shape of a V,

with a small instrument called an =alegre=, penetrating the entire

coating of the bark, in the full length of the trunk, from the thickest

branches down to the base, about 45 centimetres distance one from another.

The latex is thickened, sometimes simply with water in the proportion

of 3 to 1, and at other times with chlorate of sodium alone, or with

a mixture of alum, as is customary in Bahia and in S. Paulo, or now

again by the action of alum-stone, double sulphate of aluminium and of

potassium as is done in Pernambuco, Parahyba, and Rio Grande do Norte.

All those processes present serious inconveniences, such as the entry of

water augmenting the weight, the baneful effects and dampness arising

from the use of a large proportion of salt, or the loss of elasticity

due to the last mentioned process, which turns the rubber cracky and

resinous. The smoking process seems in every way to be advisable whenever

the richness of the milky-latex in rubber is perfectly comparable to that

of the hevea.

Whilst it is affirmed that the production per tree is from 3 to 5

kilogrammes it is more prudent to calculate the average capacity of each

tree as at 1 kilogramme.

THE ECONOMIC ORGANIZATION OF RUBBER EXPLOITATION

The economic organization of the exploitation of rubber in the Amazonic

valley still remains in its rudimentary condition, continuing almost

exactly on the same lines as those adopted when the production of this

article—one of the principal sources of the wealth of Brazil—first began

to open up.

This unaltered condition of affairs in the modifying of the economical

processes, is the consequence of the continuance of certain conditions

such as the existence of vast regions still entirely unexplored, the

progressive penetration of the seringueiros guided by the course of the

rivers into far away regions where rapid means of communication are

completely lacking, the scarcity of labor, and the necessity of capital

being embarked in the extraction of rubber.

The régime of private property is still limited, and does not extend

beyond a few kilometres into the Interior, starting from the banks of

the rivers, since the greater part of the lands still continue to be

the property of the States either of Amazonas or of Pará, and—in the

territory of the Acre—of the Federal Government.

With the object of peopling the rubber-producing regions endeavors are

being made to facilitate the acquiring of properties by furnishing their

owners with adequate guarantees of protection, special Public Departments

having already been created in the State of Amazonas and Pará devoted to

the fiscalization of the régime of lands; and the régime of lands in the

Acre Territory is about to be regulated at once by the Federal Government

in accordance with the determinations set forth in the new economic

measure known as the Rubber Defense Act.

The proprietory question originated itself in the concession of

lands granted under certain conditions such as that of its effective

exploitation and cultivation, colonization, etc., and by the legitimation

of the possession. These last were established in the following manner:

The explorer who penetrated into the forest in search of seringaes,

examined the banks of the river by which he went up and when he verified

the existence of a favorable zone, he landed and after a careful

exploration under the direction of specialist-workmen called “matteiros”

(foresters) he settled down and gave himself up to the exploitation of

the “seringal” he selected.

That occupation of virgin ground and its being made use of constituted

the act of possession, the first step towards acquiring the property. In

order to definitely assure the dominion of the lands selected, it became

necessary to obtain a title of ownership from the Government of the

State in which these lands were located, this being drawn up only after

that the respective marking out and survey by an authorized engineer or

surveyor, the depositing of the respective plans, the verification that

no anterior rights or claims existed on the part of third parties, as

also the payment of the respective taxes being satisfied, which last

averaged about 5$000 per hectare.

Only after that all these formalities had been complied with, was the

concession granted definitely, and the possession considered as complete.

The title deeds of the property with the respective specifications is

registered in special blocks, which will serve as proof in case of

future dispute and will furnish authentic documents in place of the

property-titles that may have been mislaid or lost. Once the concession

is legalized and the possession marked out, the property rights are

considered irrefutable.

The dominion of the lands being assured, their usefulness will depend

upon the co-existence of two essential factors—labor and capital.

In the regions of the Amazonian valley, sparingly peopled by the want of

direct immigration, the work is done by the natives and principally by

Cearenses, people from Ceará.

Under the general designation of =Cearenses= are comprised the

populations of the northeast of the country from Bahia to Piauhy, a

strong race endowed with rare energy. Having immigrated from their native

state fleeing from privations to which the periodical dry seasons reduce

them, they arrive completely without the means of subsistence, it being

necessary for the owners of the “seringas” who contract their services

to take measures for their transport, alimentation and maintenance in

the seringaes until with the delivery of the rubber collected, they find

themselves in a position to liquidate the debts that they have contracted

and the expenses that have been occasioned.

On the other hand in their turn the owners of seringaes not disposing of

capital are placed under the necessity of raising loans with which to

defray the exploitation of their lands. These resources are furnished

them by the traders, part in money and part in merchandise, these traders

being known as =aviadores= whilst the proprietors are called patrons or

aviados.

The extensive credits opened by the traders constitute acts of

confidence, being guaranteed more by the activity and initiative of the

proprietors of the seringaes, than by their respective properties; the

heavy burdens with which these loanings or advances of money are weighed

down, have their origin in the risk which is run by advancing such

capital, due to the difficulties of collecting the debts contracted and

the far distant nature of the lands given in guarantee. It frequently

happens that the traders do not dispose of sufficient means for carrying

out all these lending operations in which case they fall back upon

the exporting houses, who advance them the necessary money, against

a contract to hand over the rubber at a certain date and at prices

previously fixed.

Thus is established a successive dependency of the seringueiro on the

owner of the property, this latter in his turn on the merchant-trader and

finally of the merchant-trader upon the exporting house.

Thereafter it is seen how grievously the system of want of capital acts

on the whole system on the exportation of rubber and the long series of

intermediaries.

Let us see now what is the capital which the owner of the seringal

requires to possess for an exploitation of say 200 roads.

A seringal with 200 roads exacts altogether the work of 100 men, whose

engagements in the region where they reside and their transport as far

as the “seringal” costs on an average 40:000$000 and to each one of them

is supplied a sum of 350$000 destined to defray the costs of purchase

of the indispensable material for making a commencement with the work

of exploitation; out of an initial sum estimated at from 75:000$000 to

80:000$000 including casual expenses.

Arrived at their destination, the seringueiros, as they find themselves

completely without means, continue to be a burden on the budget of their

contractors during the period of the clearing the forests of brush-wood

and undergrowth, and the cutting of roads, which are the preliminaries to

the gathering in of the rubber. Up till the date of the final delivery,

which takes place from 6 to 7 months afterwards, the proprietor expends

nearly 100:000$000 with the feeding and maintenance of the seringueiros,

which is but the preface to a total sum of 180:000$000 inscribed on the

books of the aviador or merchant-trader as being the indebtedness of the

owner of the seringal.

This latter in order to meet the charges of the up-keep of the

seringueiros, establishes “vendas” or selling-stores, by means of which

he supplies not only the goods of first necessity for consumption, but

also the tools, utensils and, indeed, everything that is required for the

proper exploitation of the “seringal.”

These “vendas” or supply-stores are stocked by the merchant-trader

of Belém and Manáos, who send them periodically in steamers or steam

launches, the necessary merchandise. According to the season of the

year, the rainy or the dry season, the greater or less the distance to

be navigated, in short, in accordance with the condition of navigability

of the rivers, the trips are made fortnightly, quarterly or perhaps only

twice a year.

The merchandise dispatched is debited to the owner of the “seringal” at

the invoice price, augmented by the high expenses for insurance, freight

and a commission which varies from 20 to 30 per cent according to the

time-term stipulated for the payment in cash or the delivery of the

rubber.

The owner of the “seringal” in his turn re-sells in retail the

merchandise received, putting on a high profit to its original price; the

seringueiros who already pay interest at the rate of 20 per cent upon the

advance of the 350$000 which is made to them at the time of their being

contracted, are obliged to supply their needs exclusively in the store of

the proprietor of the “seringal” and to hand him the rubber which they

may have gathered in payment thereof.

The initial supplying of the utensils amounting to 200$000 added to

the cost of the journey which runs for account of the seringueiro

himself, absorb the 350$000 of the advance; and his expenses, whilst

the extraction of the rubber is proceeding—which lasts for 6 or 7

months—totals up to about 1:000$000, so that when he comes to hand over

the rubber, he is already responsible to the proprietor of the “seringal”

for an amount of about 350$000 including the payment for the renting of

the road explored.

His production being on an average of about 400 kilos (in certain regions

it is much greater), the worker finishes his enterprise with a very small

profit and it is not a rare case that he is not able to satisfy all his

indebtedness, a circumstance, this latter, which keeps him continually

dependent upon the owner of the “seringal.”

On handing over the rubber, the conditions of payment are adjusted and

these are generally made in one of the two following ways: either the

seringueiro sells the rubber directly to the proprietor of the “seringal”

at a reduction of one-third upon the prices ruling in the markets of

Belém or Manáos; or he encharges him to sell it in the referred-to market

with a discount of 35 kilos of rubber or with a discount of from 10 to 15

per cent of the net price of such sale, given in payment of the renting

of the road exploited.

This defective economic organization of the exploitation of rubber has,

as its consequence, the high costs of production which to-day oscillate

between 3$000 to 3$500 per kilo. This disadvantageous situation,

however, is not a permanent one and may be remedied.

We shall leave for a special chapter the explanation of the means

recently adopted for bettering the condition of the seringueiros,

augmenting their productive capacity and recompensing them more justly

for their work.

TRANSPORTS AND FREIGHTS

The problem of transports and freight continues to be one of the most

palpitating questions in Brazil, notwithstanding the great progress in

this particular made during the last 10 years.

The considerable increase in the mercantile marine and the incessant

construction of the numerous railroads of penetration, have not been able

to keep pace with the extraordinary development of the country and its

notable economic expansion, the national commerce continuing to feel the

want of further means of transport and to suffer from the very high rates

of freights.

In Amazonia, the difficulty of communication has become still more felt

because of the vast region and territories embraced in this great State,

sparingly peopled and whose centres of production are located so far

distant from the exporting markets of Manáos and Belém de Pará.

Watered in every direction by innumerable great rivers, tributaries

of the great river—the Amazon—the greatest in the world, the Amazonic

region still remains to a very great part unexplored, inestimable riches

susceptible of being extracted, lying unutilized, in virtue of the

deficiency in navigation; in fact, if the principal rivers are navigated

regularly to some extent, even though sparingly, others leading to

immensely rich regions are very rarely navigated by either ship or boats,

which might assure the transport of the products gathered.

Many and divers are the circumstances which concur towards bringing

about this state of affairs, but the most important in resumé is that of

the want of capital for the construction of ships and the establishment

of regular lines of fluvial navigation as also the obstacles offered

either by the irregular courses of some rivers obstructed by waterfalls,

shoots and rapids, or simply obstructed by the trunks of trees and other

materials or by the diminutive volume of water during the dry seasons

which makes impossible navigation of even ordinary draught.

One of the most interesting phases of the Amazonian problem is, however,

in the regulating and increasing of the navigation of the rivers, with

the object of assuring ample transport facilities and the approximation

to the centres of production with the consuming markets. The opening up

of the ways of fluvial communication is an essential condition to the

progress of the Amazonic region, by the lesser expenditure required by

transport upon water in comparison with land transportation which in

those regions would be particularly difficult and costly.

The steamers and boats which set out from Manáos or Belém for the

Interior, make the passage generally, over-charged with merchandise

which by reason of accumulation and its defective packing suffers not

rarely serious damages which has the result of bringing about a notable

increment in prices. As a general rule the cargo being greater than the

space requisite to its accommodation, makes the navigation extremely

difficult, the steamers thus not being able to make head-way against

the current, which flows at the rate of from 3 to 5 miles an hour, or

desiring to diminish the expense in the consumption of coal, seek out the

waters the less agitated and approach as much as possible the banks of

the river.

The want of minute hydrographic charts and the imprudence of the

captains, as also of the masters of steam launches and other floating

material, have, as a consequence, the bringing about of frequent

strandings, which even though they may not cause damage to the cargo

involve interruptions in the trip sufficiently prejudicial.

The unloadings are made frequently on the banks of the rivers under

little favorable conditions, by reason of the want of wharves; are

very slow and occasion besides lamentable delays, very heavy expenses

principally for the packages of great weight.

One of the causes which most determine the dearness of transport in

Amazonia, is the supply of combustibles to the steamers, these latter

taking in coal only at the port of departure in Belém or Manáos, and this

being consumed, purchase wood fuel along the route just as they require

it, and for a high price, subjecting themselves thus to the delays

incident to loading, at times very great. Coal mines in the basin of the

Caquetá have been discovered, but so far it has not been possible to

derive any benefit from them, owing to the want of the necessary studies

and analysis, which only now the Federal Government is beginning to have

made.

For the betterment of this state of things the Federal Government also

pretends to contract with a large public company for the establishment of

coal depots and combustible oil, at the most appropriate points of the

rivers on which the greatest movement takes place in the valley of the

Amazon, so that the steamers may be supplied for prices according to a

tabular statement previously approved for each year.

The descent of the floating material by the rivers is much less onerous,

as the consumption of combustibles is thereby considerably diminished,

thanks to the current which gives an easy impulsion to the floating

material; the trips are notwithstanding slow, much time being lost in

picking up cargo, almost exclusively rubber, on the banks of the rivers.

The irregularity in the navigation either due to the deficiency of the

floating material or by the natural obstacles that the flooding of the

rivers bring about, cause extensive prejudice, as it obliges the large

cargoes of merchandise upon whose price high interest is collected and

occasions them considerable loss of goods deteriorated by their remaining

for a long time in sheds and by the damaging effect of heat and dampness.

From thence arises the lamentable dearness of life and the bad

alimentation, with their evil results on the health of the inhabitants of

those far-away-regions.

The retention in the seringaes of large stocks of rubber deprived

of the means of transport must also not be forgotten and its coming

simultaneously on to the market at certain times, being taken advantage

of by speculators is an important cause of the fall in prices which

affects the interests of producers to an appreciable degree.

Regularity and frequency in navigation, permitting successive and regular

supplies of rubber would diminish in notable proportions the cost of

production, since it would cheapen the cost of labor and avoid the great

oscillations usual in the prices.

In order to obtain that desideratum it is not sufficient to create new

lines of navigation nor to augment the number of floating material

or better their conditions, but it is necessary to adopt certain

complementary measures. Thus in the impossibility of preparing from the

outset minute hydrographic charts, a measure which would require great

expenditure; it were advisable in order to make navigation more secure

to indicate by means of small light houses and illuminated buoys of

acetyline, the dangerous points which it is desirable to avoid.

In order to obviate the difficulties created by the formation of sand

banks, by the accumulation of trunks of trees, and of obstacles of all

kinds, it is necessary that attention be paid constantly to the cleansing

of the rivers and dragging them, in cases where the obstructions cannot

be removed by other means and the construction of railways and wagon

roads connecting the navigable points.

It would be of the greatest utility to bring about the extension and

opening up of telegraphic lines joining the producing centres with the

central markets, such measures would have the most beneficient results

as much for the owners of seringaes as for the shipowners, these latter

being once aware of such facilities would cause their ships to be

directed to the points where they were required to discharge merchandise

or take in rubber or vice-versa and thus avoid all uncertainty upon

the advantages to be reaped from those trips, because of the want of

knowledge of the cargoes that are being reserved for them, and those who

are in contact with them in the markets where the product is sold may be

advised as to the quotations and the market prices of the merchandise so

that they may take advantage of the most favorable times for effecting

their transactions.

The message presented by His Excellency Marchal Hermes da Fonseca,

President of the Republic of the United States of Brazil on the third of

May of this current year, made special reference to the services of the

radio-telegraph in the territory of the Acre, expressing himself in the

following terms:

“The three radio-telegraphic stations that have been contracted for in

December of 1910, are now in full working order, those of the Rio Branco

and Senna Madueira having been inaugurated in September of 1911 and in

February of this year that of Cruzeiro de Sul, which besides speaking

with those two and therefore with Manáos, communicates also with Iquitos

in the Republic of Perú.”

In order to complete this very useful improvement ordered to be done in

such a happy hour, there were also contracted for two other stations, one

of these being in Xapury and the other in Tarauacá, places having a great

future before them and already containing an appreciable population as

well as a notable material development.

With the installation of those two stations, the territory will be

perfectly well equipped in regard to the question of telegraphic

communications.

As a consequence of the dearness and the difficulties in the means of

transport we get the excessive rises in freight, which at times are equal

to and are often greater than the value of the merchandise transported;

the truth is that the crisis in rubber made them suffer a certain fall

and we no longer see such a thing happen as that the shipowner pays for

the price of his steamers in two round trips.

The dominating principle is that of liberty of commerce. In order to

assure regular services on the principal rivers, the Federal Government

as well as the Governments of the States of Amazonas and Pará subsidize

certain companies whose tables of freight charges are approved by the

Public Powers. That these are still very high is shown by the fact of

competition which in certain lines takes place between the subsidized

companies and private shipowners; the latter, however, not being able

to go beyond the tariff tables of the former, they nevertheless obtain

freights and passengers which proportion them high profits, demonstrating

thus that the tables of freight tariffs of the subsidized companies are

still a long way from the maximum of reduction.

The Commercial, Industrial and Agricultural Congress which took place

in Manáos from the 22nd to 27th of February of 1910, considering this

position, resolved to recommend to the Public Powers the remodelling of

the actual freight tariffs principally in that part of them which relate

to alimentary goods, necessary to the sustaining of the extractors of

rubber and in the sense of their being substantially cheapened.

Even to-day one of the best businesses in the Amazonic regions consists

in chartering steamers for trafficking on the rivers.

If the freight rates on the sections served by the subsidized lines

are high, greater still are these on the less favored sections where

the rapids of the rivers flowing among the seringaes, make navigation

difficult, because in these latter there being no freight tables, they

make the price according to their judgment, such prices of transport

being contracted directly according to the circumstances of the occasion

with the shipper, who has to pay the price as the masters of the steamers

are pleased or resolved to charge.

The owners of seringaes subject themselves to the heavy burdens which

they are bound to put up with, in the hope of escaping the damage that

the retention of their produce for want of transport would cause them.

It is not only the fluvial navigation freights that are much too

burdensome, for the freights for ocean navigation are also burdened with

this grave defect and thus it is that despite the fact of the distance

which separate Brazil from New York and from London, is only half that

between the consuming markets and the east, the freights for the latter

are incomparably less. It behooves the Governments of countries producing

rubber in South America to come to an arrangement so as to confer

adequate premiums on the navigation companies to Europe and to the United

States, who cheapen their freights and cut down in a satisfactory manner

the duration of the voyage.

INTERNAL MARKETS FOR RUBBER—ORGANIZATION AND WORKING—TYPES AND QUOTATIONS

Located in the centre of the most important rubber producing region of

the world, Belém and Manáos, the capitals of the two great states of the

north, are, in Brazil, the principal markets of that product. Nearly 90

per cent of the Brazilian exportation proceeds from there, the 16,000

tons of rubber which each of these markets export annually gives place to

a considerable mass of business.

If it be true that the commercial transactions gyrate around equal

quantities of rubber, Belém has the advantage over Manáos, because it is

the seat of a great part of the large exporting houses that operate in

the two capitals. Its geographical situation which permits of more rapid

communication with the markets of the south, and with foreign ports,

contributes also towards its greater commercial importance.

The uses and customs are identical in the two markets. Commerce obeys

a rule above all unfavorable to the sellers who cannot put a value on

their merchandise but are forced before all things to accept the price

imposed by the buyers. That disadvantageous condition of dependency

is the natural outcome of the deficient economic organization in the

exploitation of the rubber industry in the valley of the Amazon.

Reference has already been made in another place to the burdensome

commercial relations between the seringueiros and the patrons or

proprietors of seringaes and between the same patrons and the commercial

traders. The same vices and defects are to be found in the relations

between the commercial traders and the great exporting houses. Those

latter, possessors of large capital and united together in the common

interests, dominate the market, which, weakened by successive crises and

always in a precarious state cannot oppose them an efficacious resistance.

That situation can only be modified in the case of the actual economic

and commercial methods, which place in the hands of the merchant-trader

all the responsibility of the conduction of business in the place,

without at the same time arming them with the means of defence against

unrestricted speculations.

The merchant-trader’s houses are the intermediaries between the

seringueiros and the exporting houses. But, their principal function

is that of furnishing the seringueiro during the year all the goods

necessary to sustain him and his employes as well as supplying him with

tools, utensils, wearing apparel and in fact, everything that may be

necessary to his life in the seringaes.

This supplying is done on credit, that is to say, against the remittance

of rubber produced by the borrower and which is sold on its arrival by

the merchant-trader to the exporting houses.

The merchant-trader thus requires large capital so as to meet the

engagements that he assumes in the market with the great and numerous

supplies, which he is obliged to make.

It is incumbent on him also to transport the same for which he nearly

always employs steamers of his own, in order to bring the merchandise to

its destination in far-away regions, bringing back on the return trip the

rubber collected by his aviados, i.e., his borrowers of the seringaes.

The responsibilities assumed become due on the occasion of the arrival

of the cargoes of rubber. In fact, it is exactly at this moment that the

merchant-trader is most in need of money, because besides the imperious

duty of paying the amount of his debts and the immediate necessity which

he has of furnishing new supplies to his clients the aviados, he has

still yet expenses to disburse with the repair and fitting out of the

steamers, which owing to the bad conditions in the navigation of the

rivers return nearly always in a damaged condition; balances to pay to

the seringueiros whose debts were relatively small or advances to make to

those whose production was inferior in value to the supply sent, but who

required a new resource under the danger of otherwise not being able ever

to liquidate their debt.

Thus it is that the aviador or merchant-trader has no other remedy, but

to sell without delay the rubber which has been consigned to him and that

is the psychological moment for the decided action of the buyers.

Reduced as to number, well informed about the business and in the

possession of daily and direct notices from the consuming markets,

perfectly bound up to them by a question of mutual interest, they decide

to make the price for the merchandise that is offered to them. It is not

always that that price corresponds in reality to those of the foreign

market, but the apprehension that seizes the merchant-trader that moved

by their interests the buyers may resolve to retire the offer, does not

permit him either to hesitate or resist. He hands over the merchandise

with a small profit and not uncommonly with a loss.

Treating of an article which up till to-day has been produced in a

quantity inferior to the necessity of the industry, whose price was kept

up high, much above that which might be called a remunerative price, that

inversion of the law of economics is a very curious one, because, in this

case, it is not the producer who imposes the price, but the buyer who

does so.

The difficulties which the merchant-trader had to fight against, have

been increased lately with the advent of the “regatões,” a species of

barter-commission travelers on the rivers. This trade is exercised by

individuals acting for their own account or as agents of the merchants

and who go up the rivers with merchandise, doing business at sight in

exchange for money or rubber, diverting in this way a large part of

the transactions until now exercised through the inter-medium of the

merchant-traders.

The principal causes of the precarious position of the “aviadores” or

merchant-traders are the lack of adequate capital and the want of banking

facilities and other establishments of credit which might come to their

aid.

The export houses, however, operate with the greatest firmness. They

discount the drafts for the rubber bought, in the agencies of the English

banks, and with the product of this operation pay the merchant-traders,

and as these drafts are at 90 days sight, it is only after the rubber is

sold in New York or in Liverpool that they satisfy their indebtedness,

thus trafficking almost covered from any risk whatsoever.

* * * * *

The aviador or merchant-trader receives the rubber by the weight which

it shows at the moment of being unloaded; if the trip is a long one the

shortage in weight of the rubber may be as much as 15 per cent; if,

on the other hand, there has been no time, owing to the shortness of

the trip, for such a thing to happen, it is certain that on its being

magazined or stored-up, it will continue to =quebrar=, i.e., diminish in

weight. Thus, therefore, it is to the interest of all parties concerned

to sell it and export it as soon after its arrival as possible, which,

however, does not mean to say that the question of shortage is not an

element which comes into play in making the estimate of its value.

The classifying of the rubber is done upon the occasion of its sale, this

being an operation which necessitates a long experience and practice in

the knowledge of the article.

Two workmen with iron instruments which they call “gatos,” take hold of

the skin (smoke-cured roll or ball) by the orifice which is left in its

shape on its being made, at the same time that a third workman cuts it

down the middle with a sharp instrument called a “traçado.” By this means

it is easy to ascertain if the manufacture of the internal coatings or

layers has been done with the necessary care, and if the weight has been

affected by water, or by any other extraneous body.

If the rubber presents itself with an uniform aspect, perfectly smoked

and sufficiently elastic, it is classed “fina.” If, however, any points

present spongy parts proceeding from coagulation of the latex anterior to

the smoking process, it is styled “entre-fina.” To the agglomeration of

residue which congeals freely, the name of “sernamby” is given.

There is still the “borracha fraca” little elastic, whose mercantile

value is put in the same category as “sernamby” and which does not come

from the latex of the hevea.

This work being finished, the rubber is bought in accordance with the

quotations of the day, based upon prices coming from England and from the

United States, but as has already been explained, this quotation is not

always respected.

There is another anomaly to which it is advisable to refer: whilst the

“entre-fina” and the sernamby are quoted abroad at least at 200 réis and

1$800 réis less than the “fina” the markets of Belém and Manáos show a

difference of 800 réis and 2$000.

There are other abuses which also take place in the classifying of the

rubber, which gives as a result that the buyers prefer to do business

upon inferior qualities, because these offer a larger margin for profits.

The rubber is exported in American pineboxes which can hold nearly 150

Kilos. The dearness of manual labor in the Amazon territory makes it

difficult to take advantage of the innumerable species of timber-woods in

which the valley of the great river is so abundantly rich.

* * * * *

In the remaining markets of the country where the rubber is negotiated,

the price is regulated by the quotations in Pará. These local markets are

of little importance and in nothing do they distinguish themselves as to

the relative transactions in rubber, from the general mass of business.

The class of =aviadores= or merchant-trader does not exist. Each producer

sends his stock to his agent or representative or sells it to the first

buyer. The rubber is collected from either maniçoba or mangabeira.

In the commerce of those products, the markets of Bahia and Fortaleza

stand out the most prominently, to which places a certain appreciable

portion of cultivated plantation rubber converges every year besides a

great quantity of native rubber.

ECONOMIC AND FINANCIAL IMPORTANCE—FEDERAL AND STATE REVENUE—EXPORTATION

TAX

The most superficial examination of the actual economic position of

Brazil demonstrates at once and in an incisive manner how important the

rubber industry is to the national life of the country.

Possessor of the innumerable riches distributed by the three Kingdoms of

Nature, it is almost exclusively due to the cultivation of coffee and to

the extraction of rubber that Brazil owes its extraordinary commercial

development in these last twenty years.

The great fortunes which the plantations of the famous red-bean of the

coffee-tree created in the South and the considerable profits which

the exploitation of the precious gum have produced in the North, were

certainly the causes which most influenced the development of the

production to such an extraordinary degree, relegating to a much lower

schedule in the general tabular statement of Brazilian exportation, all

the products, whose commerce although certainly remunerative, does not

show such certain and speedy results.

The general exportation of Brazilian merchandise was £63,724,440 in 1909,

£63,091,547 in 1910 and £66,838,982 in 1911. To these totals, coffee

and rubber contributed during each of the same three years £52,401,276,

£51,342,278 and £55,458,221 respectively—totals these, sufficient by

themselves, to guarantee with advantage the Brazilian international

commercial equilibrium, when it is seen that in those said same years,

the general importation of merchandise amounted to £37,139,354,

£47,871,974 and £52,798,016.

Rubber contributed to the general total of exportation with 29.70 per

cent in 1909, 39.06 per cent in 1910 and 22.53 per cent in 1911, or in

other words an average of 30.43 per cent per annum. It is worthy of

note, that the great difference which took place in the above-mentioned

percentages is explained in the fluctuations in the prices of rubber,

since the production not only did not decrease, but, as a matter of fact,

increased from year to year. Therefore it is seen that nearly one-third

of Brazil’s export trade is supplied by rubber, and it is nearly twenty

millions of pounds sterling that Brazil receives every year, and which

goes far to provide for the sustentation, not only of the population of

the Brazilian Northwest, comprised in the great States of Pará, Amazons

and Matto-Grosso and the Federal Territory of the Acre, but for the

prosperity of the North-east States, which get the benefit of a good

part of that sum through the intermedium of their sons, who live by the

exploitation of the rubber; the Southern States benefit in their turn

by the abundance of money in the North, that most secure guarantee of

their prosperity, since that being producers of cereals, xarque, coffee,

sugar, textile goods, hats and shoes, for a long time already they have

constituted themselves the principal furnishers of food-stuffs and

wearing apparel to that region. Finally there is still to be considered

the benefit to be brought indirectly to the whole country because that

sum goes to increase the commerce of importation, thus powerfully

augmenting the Federal Customs Revenue.

The sum obtained by the States of the Amazons and Pará and by the Federal

Territory of the Acre, is also considerable every year by the tribute

paid on the rubber going out.

This last Territory of the Acre, since its incorporation with Brazil by

the Treaty of Petropolis concluded with Bolivia in 1903, cost the Union

(including the expenses incident to the acquisition of the Territory and

other resulting compromises of the said treaty, such as the arbitral

Tribunal, loans to Bolivia, marking out of the frontier, construction of

the Madeira-Mamoré Railroad and expenses for the mobilization of troops,

etc.), up till 1909 the sum of Rs. 62,595:562$038; the revenue brought in

during the same period attained the sum of Rs. 58,052:757$012, in 1910

moreover the tax upon the rubber produced was Rs. 19,867:529$159 and in

1911 Rs. 9,671:711$068, or in other words Rs. 29,539:240$227 more, which

should be carried to the credit of that very rich region. The rubber of

the Acre is exported through the intermedium of the markets of Belém and

Manáos, the impost-tax of 20 per cent ad valorem being collected on the

occasion of its shipment.

The States of Amazonas and Pará cannot dispense quickly without very

serious economic disturbance with the revenue receivable from the

tribute paid on the exportation of rubber. As a matter of fact, the

State of Amazonas collected the sum of Rs. 16,845:585$063 in 1909, Rs.

18,069:162$372 in 1910 and Rs. 12,901:477$379 in 1911; the impost-tax

upon rubber brought in those same years respectively Rs. 13,316:487$569,

Rs. 14,836:235$238 and Rs. 9,999:031$526, which can also be reckoned by

79.04 per cent, 82.11 per cent and 77.50 per cent.

The State of Amazonas taxes rubber produced in the State itself, in 18

per cent ad valorem, and that coming from the Javary, the boundary river

with Perú, in 7 per cent.

In its turn Pará has had in the form of revenue collected in those

years, the amounts of Rs. 19,039:709$531, Rs. 20,255:070$604 and Rs.

14,480:716$176, the import-tax on rubber rendering Rs. 14,602:759$269,

Rs. 14,701:894$955 and Rs. 9,518:716$267, or 76.69 per cent, 72.58 per

cent and 65.73 per cent.

The taxes charged by Pará are 22 per cent ad valorem for Rubber “fina,”

“entre-fina” and “sernamby,” and 15 per cent for whatever other kind.

Besides those there is an additional tax of 2.5 per cent in benefit of

the Santa Casa de Misericordia charged on the exportation taxes.

These figures seem to show the importance for those States of questions

concerning the production and consumption of the world’s rubber, and with

greater reason still for Brazil as a whole. The ruin of one of the most

promising regions on the face of the globe, the profound depreciation

of Brazilian finances and the dreaded commercial crisis with which the

country would have to fight, would be the disastrous effect of the

indifference of the Federal and States Governments on such a matter.

But that, however, is not the attitude of those Governments; they are

decreeing various measures now in course of being carried out and which

after minute studies were judged necessary, so that Brazil might continue

to maintain her proud position of importance for the precious “black

gold” (rubber) in the world’s market.

RUBBER-CONSUMING MARKETS—COMPETITION OF OTHER RUBBER-PRODUCING COUNTRIES

New York, Liverpool, London, Hamburg, Antwerp and Havre are at the

present time, by their order of importance, the principal world’s markets

for rubber.

New York, by virtue of the extraordinary development of North American

industries, which in a steadily increasing scale, are consuming

constantly greater quantities of raw material, receives almost half of

the rubber produced in all the world. Nearly 60 per cent of the rubber

negotiated in New York is Brazilian. After this follow Central America

and Mexico; but as rubber proceeding from all parts appears in the New

York market it is evident that there is no specialty in this business.

Liverpool, perhaps due to the fact of its being the port to which the

lines of navigation that run to and from the Amazon are directed, has

become the European emporium for Brazilian rubber. In fact, 40 per cent

of the Brazilian production is directed towards that city. Liverpool

also receives rubber of various qualities proceeding from the English and

other European possessions in equatorial Africa.

The increasing production of the Oriental plantations finds in London one

of its principal markets for the precious gum. Although rubber proceeding

from different parts appears in the market, it may be affirmed without

hesitation, that London is the special centre for cultivated refined

rubber (plantation) which is easily explained by the fact that the owners

of the extensive plantations in the Malay States are nearly all of them

London companies.

Occidental and Oriental Africa, principally German Colonies, send to

Hamburg the greater part of the rubber which is negotiated on that

market. Brazil enters with about 20 per cent of the total amount of the

business.

Antwerp owes its rubber trade to the creation of the Congo Free State,

whose production, now in decline, is practically all directed to this

city. It also receives rubber from Brazil, and seeing that Belgian

capital is employed in the Oriental plantations its future is promising.

Havre, on the other hand, is of greater importance to Brazil; where 75

per cent of the transactions are in Brazilian rubber. It also imports the

Congo species, as also those of some of the French Colonies in Africa.

However, the great bulk of the production of these latter colonies is

directed to Bordeaux.

* * * * *

The methods of sale adopted in these markets, vary very much. From the

slow old-fashioned process of sale by private treaty, to sales on time

terms, passing through auctions and underwritings, in short all the

commonly known modes of negotiating are in use.

The most important market, that of New York, adheres to the old-fashioned

method of personal contracts for immediate delivery, which certainly

serves better the interests of buyers, than those of sellers; the

agitation that was created round this question with a view to reform the

market, gave no result whatsoever.

Liverpool presents us the polymorphic type. Private sales, and sales on a

fixed day for delivery, or sales by auctions, all take place, consulting

thereby the preferences of both sellers and buyers, and establishing the

free course of the values. The same happens in London, where, however,

the Plantation companies have initiated more advanced transactions, such

as sales of crops in anticipation.

Hamburg and Antwerp also practice sales by auction and on delivery.

However, in this latter the method of underwriting is that most in vogue

and which among all the processes is the one that consults most the

interest of the seller. This is carried out in the following manner: A

broker advertises a certain quantity of rubber for sale, the particulars

of which he supplies (name of seller, weight, quality, estimated price,

etc.), about twenty days beforehand. On the day appointed, he receives

the offers of purchase closed and sealed; these are then opened in a

public place and the prices are inscribed on a schedule divided into

columns, each one headed with the name of the house offering. Once this

operation has finished, the rubber falls to the highest bidder. The

seller has, however, the right to withdraw the goods in case the price

that results does not satisfy him.

The Antwerp market adopted this system with the view to competing against

cognate markets. As the reducing of the expenses on the product, which

corresponded to frs. 2.60 per 100 Kilos, the same being frs. 4.93 and

frs. 7.30 in Hamburg and Liverpool respectively, did not suffice, it

endeavored to attract the seller by offering the most advantageous

prices, and it seems that it has succeeded in its desideratum.

Havre followed its example and it is greatly to be desired that all the

rubber markets adopt the same system, not only for the reasons set forth,

but also because it is a safe precaution against the manipulations of

speculators.

Brazil has always maintained its predominating position in the world’s

market for rubber, not only as the greatest producer, but also as the

producer of the best quality.

In 1827, the first year about which statistical data exist, Brazil

exported 31 tons of rubber; in 1837, 289 tons, or say an increase of 932

per cent; in 1847, 624 tons, or 216 per cent more; in 1857, 1,800 tons,

which corresponds to an increase of 290 per cent; in 1867, 5,826 tons,

or 322 per cent more; 1877, 9,215 tons, thus augmenting by 158 per cent;

in 1887, 13,290 tons, or 144 per cent increase; in 1897, 21,256 tons,

representing about 160 per cent more; and, finally, in 1907, 36,490 tons,

or approximately an increase of 172 per cent.

Within the last decade, that is to say, from 1902 to 1911 (vide

statistical statements =in fine=), the exportation rose gradually to

28,631 tons in 1902 and to 39,026 tons in 1909, the maximum ever reached

so far, to descend immediately to 38,546 tons in 1910 and 36,547 tons in

1911.

Brazil has so far not had any serious competition to fear. It is true

that the other producing countries in Central America, South Africa and

Asia, send a considerable quantity of rubber on to the market, but this

does not affect the Brazilian trade, because, besides being practically

all of it of an inferior quality, such extra supply is not sufficient

to occasion the harmful effects of an overproduction. It is curious

to observe, that even within the last decade, the production of those

regions which in 1901 was 21,547 tons increased even so far as to surpass

the production of Brazil in the year of 1905, reaching then 35,428 tons;

but it diminished as rapidly as it had increased and in 1911 we see it

reduced to 23,747 tons. This decrease cannot be attributed to the effects

of competition, for instance to the plantations of the Orient, whose

production commenced to accentuate itself exactly in the year of 1905

and henceforward. As a matter of fact, competition should bring forth a

fall in prices, but however, on the contrary, such did not happen, the

quotations reaching in the years of 1909 and 1910 such extremes as had

never been seen in the rubber market. It will be sufficient to point out,

that the refined rubber of Pará, which is the Standard regulating type

of the market and whose average annual price has been 3, 4 and even 5

shillings, went up in those years to 12s/6 per pound.

However, a new competitor did appear, which had to be taken into

consideration, and which induced the Government of Brazil to adopt some

measures tending to protect its great article of export. The considerable

and methodical plantations of the =hevea brasiliensis= made in the

peninsula of Malacca in Malasia and on the island of Ceylon, commenced to

produce rubber, which it was predicted would within a few years, due to

the enormous quantity produced at a low figure, get the mastery of the

market.

These plantations, the initial experiments of which date from the year of

1876, with 70,000 seeds sent from the Tapajóz river, an affluent of the

Amazon, by Wickham to the Royal Botanical Garden of Kew, have taken an

enormous increment since the year 1896, till to-day, due to the results

obtained which indicated beyond possible doubt the advantages of the

cultivation of hevea, this in view of the constantly increasing price

of the product and the new applications which day after day the rubber

industry has opened up.

The cultivated-plantation rubber, which appeared on the market with 5

tons in 1901, was represented by 646 tons five years later and at the end

of another equal period, by 12,000 tons. It is estimated that if nothing

unforeseen happens to the contrary, its production in 1916 will be 70,000

tons, thus reaching the quantity which is at the present moment consumed

each year by the necessities of the industry.

It is believed that by that time the inferior qualities furnished

by Africa, Central America and even by Brazil, will gradually have

disappeared from the market. In order to meet the consumption which, if

progression that hitherto has taken place, continues, will then be of

98,603 tons, the production of Brazil and of the Orient together will

surely render a quantity much superior to that demand.

The average cost per Kilo of fine Pará rubber in the valley of the Amazon

is from 3$000 to 3$500; in India of 2$650; however, this difference

should disappear under the operation of the Rubber Defence Act, which

is inserted further on, and the possible augmentation of the price in

the Orient, where manual labor will become dearer later on when all its

plantations are in full exploitation, and by the consequent scarcity of

labor, against which agriculturists are already commencing to struggle.

The industrial element still continues to give preference to the

Brazilian rubber, this being better in quality, =nerve= and in

elasticity—properties these which may probably be attributed to the

process of curing, which is not employed in the Orient, or possibly to

the meteorologic and climate conditions, the geological composition

of the soil, etc. It is true that the quotation for planted rubber

has been superior to that of wild rubber, but it is advisable not to

forget, that while the former shrinks only 3 per cent, and has a much

better appearance, the latter loses 18 per cent of its weight. The price

difference is thus amply explained and when accounts are made up it is

still the fine quality from Pará that is the better quoted.

THE INDIA RUBBER PROBLEM—MEANS SUGGESTED AND RESOLVED BY THE STATES

Threatened with losing the predominant position it has always occupied in

the rubber market of the world, Brazil could not, without committing an

economical suicide, remain inactive.

The time having come when native rubber would enter into competition with

planted rubber, Brazil had to defend its interests by becoming equipped

for the struggle, making the cost of its product cheaper in order to

ensure its occupying an advantageous position in the market.

Many are the causes which at present contribute to the high cost of

Brazilian rubber, but they may be united into three groups, as follows:

1st, expensive labour; 2nd, heavy transport tariffs; and 3rd, excessive

export taxes.

The expensive labour is due to the scantiness of population in the Amazon

valley, the want of foreign immigration to compensate it, and the high

cost of food supplies.

The rubber-producing trees (seringaes) of the Amazon are exploited

by the natives, whose number is but small, and by the immigrants from

the eastern States who, fleeing from the droughts which periodically

befall those States and attracted by the liberal profits offered by the

extraction of rubber, go there in thousands every year. This current of

immigration is, however, insufficient; a proper remedy for such a state

of things would perhaps be foreign labour which still keeps back from the

North because it only knows it through garbled information. The bad food

and the indifference for all that concerns health conditions, contribute

every year to the invaliding of a considerable number of men.

The extraction of India rubber being the occupation which pays best in

the Amazon Valley, the pastoral industry, cattle-breeding and farming are

altogether despised, so that all the articles of subsistence needed by

the population, either come from the South of Brazil, burdened by cost of

a long transport, or from abroad overloaded with high Brazilian Customs

duties.

The heavy transport tariffs are due to the numerous difficulties of all

sorts that thwart navigation in the affluents and sub-affluents of the

Amazon river and to the greediness of ship-owners, encouraged by the

absence of competition. On the other hand, the existence of a complete

river system has made the Brazilian Governments disregard the necessity

of establishing railways which, by shortening distances, might bind the

different affluents of the great river to each other.

Finally, the excessive taxation imposed by the States of Amazonas and

Pará on its almost only product of exportation is a consequence of the

special conditions of life in that Brazilian region, which conditions we

have just described. The Governmental and administrative system requires

large sums for its maintenance, is unable to avail itself of any other

sources of income because they hardly exist. The legislator has had to go

on taxing the great product more and more.

In order to cheapen the product, besides removing the causes which have

just been shown, two other far-reaching measures have been suggested; the

adoption of a process for coagulation of the latex which might decrease

the production of inferior rubbers, and planting on a big scale.

At the present moment the exportation of rubber from the Amazon is

composed of 50 per cent of rubber “fina,” 10 per cent of “entre-fina,”

25 per cent of “sernamby,” and 15 per cent of “caucho.” Now, any process

that can do away with or might at least diminish the percentage of

entrefina and sernamby would be a means of cheapening the rubber of finer

quality (fina). To apply the same activity to produce 70 or 75 Kilos of

“fina” instead of 50 fina, 10 entrefina and 15 sernamby, is the same

in reality as obtaining the first quality at a very much lower price.

Such is the desideratum of the process of Dr. Carlos de Cerqueira Pinto,

a Brazilian doctor who has lived for a great number of years among the

rubber districts where he has made a most accurate study of the subject.

The results hitherto attained are very satisfactory, the Government of

Brazil having aided the inventor with a view to spreading his invention

once its advantages have been definitely proven.

At the same time, the process of extracting the rubber from trees

disseminated in the interior of the forests at a considerable distance

one tree from the other, is against all principles of economy. The

planting on a large scale, on the margin of the Amazon river, or of its

big affluents, but in places of easy access, is an essential measure,

especially seeing that the Government aims at maintaining for Brazil in

future, the prominent position it now occupies in the trade. Therefore,

whilst considering all the complex elements of the question thoroughly,

a study had to be made of all the solutions presented. We shall now see

what procedure was followed:

In August, 1909, a Congress of seringueiros (rubber gatherers), assembled

in Acre with a view to studying and discussing the situation of the

rubber trade. In a message addressed to the President of the Republic at

the closing of the proceedings, the members of the Congress suggested, as

chief measures, easy communications, roads, railway lines, subventioned

lines of steamers, colonization promoted by the Government and a

reduction in the export duty.

Later on, in the same year, the Pará Government enacted Laws Nos. 1,100

and 1,109 of the 5th and 6th of November, both of which have great

bearing on the solution of this most important problem.

The first of said laws gives authority, in article 1st, to the State

Government, to enter into agreements with one or more native or

foreign companies, in regard to the plantation and exploitation of the

seringueira (hevea brasiliensis) against the concession of the following

favors:

a. The concession of vacant lands up to twenty thousand hectares with

proper demarkations for the Company’s plantings.

b. Reduction in the export duty of planted rubber to the extent of 50 per

cent in the first 10 years as from the date of the first exportation;

of 40 per cent in the second decade; of 30 per cent thenceforward until

completion of twenty years.

c. Reduction of 30 per cent in the tariffs of the Bragança railway and in

the freights of the line of steamers subventioned by the State, during a

term of twenty years, for planted rubber produced by the Company.

d. Transport free of charge by the Bragança railway and steamers under

the States’ subsidy of all machinery and plant belonging to the Company

and intended for the installation of its establishments; and of whatever

colonists the Company may place in its premises as well as of seeds,

manure plants and cattle.

e. An advance, by way of guaranteed interest, of 5 per cent per annum on

the capital issued by the company holding the concession to the extent of

one-half of the paid up capital.

Special paragraph.—This guarantee, whatsoever be the Company’s capital,

shall not be paid on a sum exceeding £400,000 Sterling over and above

£800,000 Sterling, or its equivalent in paper money.

The advances, by way of guaranteed interest, thus conceded, will be

discontinued once the Company’s profits attain 6 per cent, and on

exceeding 7 per cent the Company will start amortizing the sums loaned by

the State to the extent of 5 per cent on the total sum advanced.

The concession of lands available will be made by way of emphyteusis for

99 years.

The Statutes will have to be approved by the Government, who will name

one of the Company’s Directors and retain certain rights with a view to

the due enforcement of the contract.

Article Second of the Law describes the Company’s obligations, which are

as follows:

First. To plant at least twenty thousand rubber trees per year.

Second. To carry out instructions from the Agriculture Department of the

State in the planting.

Third. To maintain a rural elementary school, with accommodation for the

shelter of at least twenty destitute children, and a field of practical

tuition of mechanical agriculture, experimental cultivation of tropical

plants, experiments in manure, etc.

Fourth. Accessory planting of rice, maize, haricot beans, etc., improving

the quality of same by mechanical means.

Fifth. Furnish accurate yearly statistics of the number of plantations

made, their state and the general production of rubber and other articles.

Sixth. Use on the bags, boxes and other receptacles containing the

goods produced, a trade-mark duly registered at the Board of Trade as

prescribed by law.

Seventh. Allow the Government to control all the work carried out by the

Company in such manner as the Government may think fit.

Complementary to the former, the Law of November 6th concedes prizes and

other favors to the agriculturists of the State, who, by themselves or

associations formed by them, should fulfil the conditions set forth in

same.

The prizes are of five hundred mil réis for each plot of five hundred

rubber trees properly planted; the favors consist of the distribution

free of charge of chemical manure, seeds, plants, instructions and

agricultural monographs, gratuitous tuition to all the laborer-planters,

transport free by the Bragança Railway and steamers subsidized by the

State, reduction of export duties, =etc.=

Lastly, Law No. 1,115, of the 8th November, 1909, affords protection to

the rubber trees that are actually yielding, with a view to improving

their production.

Article First authorizes the Government of the State to further the

defence of the rubber industry as regards the latex and preparation of

rubber, in order to prevent the destruction of the trees existing in the

State, punishment being dealt to whomsoever manufactures the product by

subversive means.

Article second provides a prize of 50 contos of réis paper money at

most, to be awarded at the Government’s discretion, to the discoverer or

inventor of some process of manufacturing or preparing rubber, which may

afford undeniable advantages as regards its manufacture and reduces the

inferior classes to a single standard of rubber “fina,” ensuring a high

price for the article.

The State of Amazonas also, as per Law No. 675 of May 20, 1911,

authorizes the Executive Power to concede any advisable favors to

individuals or undertakings that may bind themselves to put up in Manáos

factories for refinement of rubber by means of new and improved methods,

so as to obtain a standard class of rubber for exportation.

The Commercial, Industrial and Agricultural Congress held at Manáos

in February, 1910, resolved in its final conclusions to recommend to

the Brazilian Government and the immediate neighboring Republics, the

reforming of their freights, especially as regards the food supplies;

grant favors to navigation; free rivers from obstructions; construct

railways; create colonial centres; admit of the pressing and absolute

necessity to plant rubber trees in the Amazon valley and open new fields

of plantation; suggests the establishment of permanent exhibitions of a

highly educational character; advises the rubber extractors not to give

up the process of curing by smoke and condemns entirely the use of acids

or alum in the coagulation, and calls attention to the question of the

commercial classes of rubber which should be properly defined. Going into

details it requests numerous favors for the agriculturists that may go

in for planting hevea rubber trees, cacao and cereals, cotton and other

products, and that prizes be granted to cattle breeders, experimental

fields be opened, as also laboratories of analysis and a service be

established for dealing with the yellow fever and paludinous fevers, etc.

Such an important matter could not be solved by half-measures; it was

necessary and even indispensable to adopt a plan embracing all the

solutions suggested and proclaimed as being elements of success, thus

obtaining a united plan entailing some complexity in its execution, it is

true, yet clear and simple in its combined purposes.

And this desideratum was achieved by the Federal Law No. 2,543 A of the

fifth of January, 1912.

MEASURES ADOPTED BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT—RIO DE JANEIRO CONGRESS OF

RUBBER—REGULATIONS OF THE NEW RUBBER DEFENSE ACT

For a long time back the attention of the Brazilian Government has been

drawn to the necessity of adopting a plan of defence for India rubber,

which might solve in a practical and decisive manner the so-long-debated

“problem of the North.”

In August, 1911, the Minister of Agriculture, after a close study,

made with the aid of specialists and persons having full knowledge of

that region of the country, drew up a project in the above sense and,

recognizing the necessity of still hearing those who are most directly

interested in the matter, convened a meeting of representatives of the

State Governments, Commercial Associations and other Institutions which

might lead to a perfect understanding of what was most advisable to do.

The first meeting was held on August 14, and the Government’s plan

was hailed with great applause, the same being approved, with slight

alterations, in the last session which took place on the twenty-second of

the same month.

By Message of September 14, 1911, Marshal Hermes da Fonseca, President of

the Republic, sent to the National Congress for approval, the plan duly

elaborated; after being carefully studied by Congress it was approved and

converted into Law, under No. 2,543 A and was sanctioned on January 5,

1912.

On April 17, 1912, Decree No. 9,521 was enacted with the Regulation for

carrying out the measures and services provided for in the law of January.

The measures and services prescribed by Law No. 2,543 A of January,

1912, for the economic defence of rubber, regulated by Decree No. 9,521

of April 17, 1912, are as follows:

I. To encourage the rubber extractor and the cultivator of the principal

rubber-producing trees.

II. To form industries for the refinement and manufacture of rubber

articles.

III. To aid immigrants, both from the country and those who have recently

arrived from abroad, and the workmen already established in the Amazon

valley.

IV. To render transport easy and decrease the cost in the Amazon valley.

V. To install productive centres of food supplies in the Amazon valley.

VI. To hold three-yearly exhibitions in Rio de Janeiro, comprehending all

that relates to the rubber industry of the country.

The measures contained in the law in regard to making agreements with

the States which produce rubber “seringa,” with a view to decreasing

the export duties and protecting the rubber trade, will be dealt

with separately, and with regard to the definition and legalization

of freeholds in the Federal Territory in Acre and the revision and

consolidation of regulations concerning the coasting service of steamers

(included in No. IV) special By-Laws will be drawn up which shall be

published in due course.

* * * * *

The measures in reference to the first group and whose object is to

encourage the extracting industry and plantation of the principal rubber

producing trees are: First, reduction of the cost of tools and materials

employed in the rubber trade; second, granting of prizes in money to

the planters of the principal rubber trees; third, installation of

experimental stations for the cultivation of rubber.

For the reduction in the cost of utensils and materials, free entrance is

granted with exemption from any import duties, as well as to everything

intended for the cultivation of the seringueira, caucho, maniçoba and

mangabeira and the gathering-in and improving of rubber extracted from

those trees; whether as regards the extracting industry or the plantation

work.

These pecuniary premiums for encouraging the industry, will be conceded

to all those who plant entirely anew, or who devote themselves to

replanting; in the first case and for every group of 12 hectares, the

premiums will be Rs. 2:500$000 when the planting is of “seringueira”;

Rs. 1:500$000 when it treats of “caucho” or “maniçoba”; and 900$000 when

it is mangabeira; in the second case and for every group of 25 hectares

the premiums will be 2:000$000, 1:000$000 and 720$000 respectively. The

minimum number of trees for the new plantations will be 250 per hectare

for the seringueira and caucho, and 400 for the maniçoba and mangabeira;

in the case of re-planting, the distance to keep between the trees should

be from 6 metres to 6m50 for the first mentioned case and 5 metres

for the second. In order to obtain the payment of the premium, it is

requisite that the trees be well cared for, and that not more than 15 per

cent are damaged or useless.

The subsidiary cultivation of alimentitious plants or of those useful for

industrial purposes, will secure an annual gratuity corresponding to 5

per cent of the value of the principal premium.

For the cultivation of the seringueira, experimental stations will be

localized in the Territory of the Acre, and in the States of Matto

Grosso, Amazonas, Pará, Maranhão, Piauhy and Bahia and for the growing

of the maniçoba conjointly with that of the mangabeira in the States of

Piauhy, Ceará, Pernambuco, Bahia, Minas Geraes, S. Paulo, Goyaz, Paraná

and Matto Grosso.

Each station will have an area of from 80 to 100 hectares, the land

selected having to be suited to the climatic and agrological conditions

exacted by the nature or quality of the plant to be cultivated.

Besides the grounds for experimental cultivation, each station will

possess laboratories of vegetable physiology for the testing of seeds

and phytopathology, of agricultural entomology; of agricultural

vegetable chemistry and bromotology and of microbiology and technology;

an agricultural and woodlands museum; a gallery of machines and a

meteorological post. Thus it will be properly equipped in order to

serve those who may consult it upon any matter whatsoever, within the

scope of its competency, carry out the analysis of manures and other

chemical fertilizers, plants and waters, distribute plants and selected

seeds, study the diseases common to growing plants and the means of

combatting them, making commonly known by means of the publication of

an official bulletin which will be distributed gratuitously to all

interested parties, the results obtained relative to the most practical

and economical means of carrying out the cultivation of rubber, the best

means of bettering its condition, its preservation, the packing of the

products, etc.

* * * * *

In order to stimulate the creation in Brazil of the industries for

refining and manufacturing all kinds of articles made of rubber, monetary

premiums will be instituted as well as exemption from taxes, the right

of disappropriation for private individuals, that may be necessary

for the installation and mounting of factories and the preference of

the Government will be granted for such articles, which each factory

produces, when supplies are made to the army and to the navy, as well as

to other public departments.

The premiums will be as high as 400:000$000 for the first factory for the

refining of seringa rubber that may be established in each of the cities

of Belém and Manáos; up to 100:000$000 for the first rubber-refining

factory of “maniçoba” and of mangabeira, which may be installed in each

one of the States of Piauhy, Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte, Pernambuco,

Bahia, Minas Geraes and São Paulo; and finally of 500:000$000 for the

first factory of rubber-made articles, which is inaugurated in Manáos,

Belém, Recife, Bahia and Rio de Janeiro.

The exemption from import duties embraces the rights of importation

for the materials, machinery, utensils and the necessary tools for the

construction and mounting of the factory and the chemical substances,

textile articles and divers materials, combustibles and lubricants

indispensable for the up-keep and working of the factory during the

time-term of 25 years; and immunity from the State and Municipal taxes

for the time term of the contract by reason of the factory being

considered a Federal Service.

The premium in cash shall only be considered when the capital of the

factory is equivalent to 4 times its value. The payment of such premium

will be effected immediately after the inauguration of the factory.

The problem of assisting immigrants both national and foreign, who may

have just arrived and the laborers established in the valley of the

Amazon, is met by the installation of emigrant-hotels in Belém, in Manáos

and in the Territory of the Acre, by the construction of hospitals in the

Interior and by the creation of agricultural colonies adjacent to such

hospitals.

The hotels for the reception of immigrants shall follow the rule and be

guided in their installation by that of the Ilha das Flores in Rio de

Janeiro, that latter being considered a Model Institution, at the same

time the modifications exacted by the conditions of each particular case,

that of Belém having sufficient capacity to accommodate 1,500 immigrants;

that of Manáos 1,200 and that of Acre 800. Close to each of these

immigrant-quarters, a store-house will be erected which shall contain

all kinds of special tools and utensils employed in the India rubber

industry, the which will be sold to the immigrants, who desire to buy

them at strictly cost price.

The families of both national and foreign immigrants who do not

expressly declare that they prefer another destination will be sent to

the National Fazendas (ranches) of the Rio Branco, where they will be

located and distributed among the different colonial centres in the

different colonies.

The hospitals in the Interior are created with a view of providing the

inhabitants of the Amazon valley with a centre to which they may have

recourse and where they may be treated, acquire medicine and protect

themselves against contagious diseases. The points selected for these are

Boa Vista of the Rio Branco, S. Gabriel on the Rio Negro, Teffé or Fonte

Boa on the river Solimões, São Felippe on the river Juruá, Bocca do Acre

on the Rio Purús, at the confluence of the river Arinos with the Juruéna,

in the Alto Tapajóz, Conceição of the river Araguaya, and Montenegro on

the Amapá.

Each hospital will have accommodation for 100 sick people and will be

divided into 5 pavillions, one of these latter being constructed with

all the requisites necessary for the isolation of infectious diseases;

there will also be a disinfecting house, a laboratory for chemical and

microbiologic diagnosis, rooms for surgical operations and for autopsies,

consulting rooms and pharmacy.

There will also be a service of propaganda of the habits and hygienic

measures necessary for the laborers who work and live in the Amazonian

valley.

Adjoining each hospital, agricultural centres will be founded wherein to

localize 100 families at the least, these agricultural centres will have

for their object the production of the alimenticiary products necessary

for the supply of the said hospitals, the cultivation and extensive

breeding of the plants and animals consumed as food by the neighboring

population located all around, and the constitution of fixed centres of

population which shall help towards the increased peopling of the region.

The Government will assist the emigrants in the acquiring of lands and

shall furnish them with food stuffs at a low price and their maintenance

during the initial period.

* * * * *

Amongst the improvements and means tending to facilitate transport and

diminish its cost in the valley of the Amazon, the construction of

systems of railways and the betterment of the navigability of the rivers

most peopled, is of great importance.

The network of iron roads will be of two different categories: systems

of great lines forming an integral part of the general Federal system of

railroads and a network of economic narrow-gauged railways having the

character simply of penetration lines.

Belonging to the first of these categories the following networks will

be commenced at once, and constructed within the shortest space of time

possible: 1º starting from Belém de Pará and joining onto the general

railway system in Pirapóra, Minas Geraes and in Coroatá, in Maranhão,

with the necessary branches to connect the initial or terminal point of

navigation on the rivers Araguaya, Tocantins, Parahyba and S. Francisco;

2º starting point from the Madeira e Mamoré Railway in the proximity of

the mouth of the Abunã, passing by the town of Rio Branco and by the most

appropriate point between Senna Madueira and Catay and terminating in the

town of Thaumaturgo, with branch line right up to the frontier of Perú,

along the valley of the river Purús.

The construction and renting out of these railways will be done in

competition by Public Tender.

The concession for the railways of the second category shall only be made

to those who undertake to colonize and exploit in proportion as that may

be justified, the respective marginal lands, i.e., the land lying along

each side of such said lines. The Government will concede a subsidy of

25:000$000 per kilometre constructed; the technical conditions are: a

line of the Decauville portatil, the weight of the rails being 50 kilos

per metre, with a gauge of 0.60 between the rails and the minimum radius

of the curve 40 meters inclination 0.10 and weight of the locomotives in

full working order, 18 to 20 tons.

By way of experiment the Governments will bring about at once, the

construction of 2 economic railway systems, 1º starting from Antiga

Sauzel on the left bank of the river Xingú and going up the valley as

far as the river Careahy, with a branch leading to the river Tapajóz,

whose valley it will follow until the river S. Manoel and with other

sub-branches; 2º starting from the confluent of the Rio Negro with the

Rio Branco and following the valleys of Seruiny and the Caratimani

passing over the water-shed and going on until it terminates in the Alto

Uraricoera, with 2 branches, the one for the Alto Paduary and the other

for the town of Boa Vista.

The necessary improvements to be made towards effecting the navigability

of the rivers at all seasons of the year, by steamers drawing up to 3

feet of water, of the Rio Negro, between S. Isabel and Cucuhy, on the Rio

Branco from its mouth as far as S. Joaquim; of the river Purús between

Hiutanahã and Senna Madureira, and of the river Acre from its mouth as

far as Riosinho de Pedras, will be contracted for by public-tender or by

some public company which can prove itself sufficiently capable for the

carrying out of the same. The maximum time-term for the termination of

the improvements will be 7 years.

As supplementary measures, the exemption from taxes is conceded to the

floating material of whatever kind destined to fluvial navigation in

the valley of the Amazon and floating depots for the supply of coal and

oil-fuel will be established at different points of the river Amazon, its

affluents and sub-affluents.

The establishment of these depots and the business of supplying the

combustibles will be done by signed contract, with the Minister of

Agriculture, after the competition by public-tender, the concessioner

enjoys besides other favors, exemption from import-duties for the

floating material and for the combustible material imported as also full

exemption from all State and Municipal taxes by reason of the object of

his contract being considered a federal public service.

* * * * *

The creation of centres for producing food-stuffs in the valley of the

Amazon being held as an element of the greatest urgency towards the

successful issue of the plan elaborated, is assured by the following

series of administrative measures: 1º, the renting out of the 2 national

ranches on the Rio Branco, that of S. Bento and that of S. Marcus, to

a public Company or undertaking which agrees to open up, and practice

cattle-breeding of different kinds on a large scale and the cultivation

of cereals commonly used as aliments, the establishment of a curing

establishment for preparing dry meat, known as xarque, and a factory of

alimenticiary conserved goods, a dairy establishment, a rice-mill and 2

mandioca grinding-mills. The company in question will take charge of and

localize the emigrants who desire to be placed upon the lands belonging

to the said ranches in accordance with the Federal laws regulating such

matters.

The favors of exemption from duties for the imported material necessary

to the mounting of the fazenda or ranch and the installation of the mills

and factories will be conceded, as also for the stud-cattle and seeds

imported and for the chemical manures and all materials necessary for the

factories and for the cultivation during the whole of the time of the

contract. They shall also enjoy the right to disappropriate for public

utility and shall have preference for the contract to carry out the

necessary works and improvements in the navigation of the Rio Branco.

The colonization of the lands of the “fazenda” of São Marcus situated

between the rivers Mahú, Takutú, Surumú and Cotingo on the frontier of

British Guyana, will be made directly by the Ministry of Agriculture.

2º Premiums and favors will be conceded to whomsoever may found great

ranches for cattle breeding and for great agricultural purposes in

territory of the Acre (between Rio Branco and Xapury), in the State of

Amazonas (in the region of the Autaz), in the State of Pará (in the

Island of Marajó), or in other more convenient points of the lower Amazon.

These premiums are of 30:000$000 per group of 1,000 hectares of

artificial pastures, planted and fenced round, of 100:000$000 per group

of 1,000 hectares of lands effectively cultivated with rice, black

haricot beans, Indian-corn and mandioca, and 100:000$000 per group of 500

tons of manufactured goods, of dairy produce and of preserved meat and

xarque, which may have been produced within a time-space of 5 years.

The favors are those of exemption from import duties for everything

whatsoever that may be necessary to the proper installation and

maintenance of the fazenda or ranch during 5 years. 3º Concession of

favors to a fishing company or undertaking, that shall be established

either in Belém or in Manáos, for exercising that industry and all

subsidiary industries connected therewith on a large scale on the rivers

of Amazonia. The favors consist of the entry free from import duties for

all the material belonging to the company as also for all the fittings of

steamers and other floating material and factories that may be necessary

during the first 15 years, encouragement premiums of 10:000$000 during 5

consecutive years in the event of the production of fish either preserved

or salted being maintained at a figure above 100 tons; the right of

disappropriation for public utility of the lands or buildings that may

be necessary for the undertaking, the exemption from state and municipal

taxes.

* * * * *

Recognizing the utility of periodical expositions which are held as

centres of special studies, producing practical results by the sum of

knowledge which may be derived from them, 3 yearly expositions shall be

held in Rio de Janeiro, which shall embrace all and everything which has

relation to the rubber-industry.

THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORK—THE EXPOSITION OF RUBBER IN RIO DE JANEIRO

IN THE MONTH OF MAY, 1913

The Superintendence Department of the Rubber-Defence, a provisional

Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, Industry and Commerce on which

is incumbent the direction and fiscalizing of all the services comprised

under the Law No. 2543 of the fifth of January of 1912, has already

initiated its works, undertaking the execution of the following measures.

1. Resolution to hold a National Rubber Exhibition in Rio de Janeiro,

opening on the thirteenth of May of 1913.

2. Installation of experimental stations, 7 centres for the cultivation

of the seringueira (Acre, Amazonas, Pará, Maranhão, Piauhy, Bahia and

Matto Grosso), and 6 for the cultivation of maniçoba and mangabeira

(Piauhy, Ceará, Pernambuco, Bahia, Minas Geraes and São Paulo).

3. Studies in the valley of the Amazon, in the basins of the rivers

Negro, Solimões, Juruá, Purús, Tapajóz and Araguaya, and in the territory

of Amapá for the establishment of interior hospitals surrounded by small

agricultural colonies.

4. Preliminary services for the construction of 4 of those hospitals

situated respectively in Teffé or Fonte Boa on the river Solimões in S.

Felippe on the river Juruá, in Bocca do Acre and in Montenegro of the

Amapá.

5. Drawing up of the plan and inventory of the cattle and buildings

in the part to rent out of the National fazendas of the Rio Branco;

idem of the part to be colonized by the Government and projects of the

colonial centres model farm for cattle-breeding, horse and mule-raising,

radiographic stations, etc.

6. Laying of a Decauville line of railway along the rapids of the Rio

Branco, in order to secure prompt communication with the national

ranches, which are to be let out.

7. Construction by contract or by administration of 3 dwelling quarters

for immigrants in the Acre, in Manáos and in Belém.

* * * * *

The rubber exposition which is to take place in Rio de Janeiro, 1 every 3

years, will have for its object to show the triennial balance of rubber

in its various modalities, comparing it with the situation of the same

industry in other countries.

The first exhibition will be inaugurated on the thirteenth of May of the

coming year and will be divided into four sections; 1º The cultivation;

2º extraction; 3º improvement; 4º manufacture of articles.

The sections will be divided into groups and classes comprising the

native or cultivated plants, machinery, utensils, processes, commercial

types, studies and statistics.

Encouragement premiums will be conferred for the best processes

of cultivation, extraction and preparing and for the objects best

manufactured, whether of raw material constituting trade types for

exportation or as manufactured articles.

The sale of machinery, utensils and rubber articles and products of all

kinds will be provided for against payment of a small percentage, fixed

by the organizing commission.

Foreign products may be admitted to the exhibition, but without having

the right to a premium. They will enjoy full custom-house freedom from

import-duty, but should they be sold they shall pay the respective

import-duty on the occasion of their being handed over to the buyers.

The re-exportation of the products not sold will run for account of the

exhibitor.

Lectures upon the rubber-industry will be given during the

Exhibition-Congress.

The Commission which will carry out the Exposition of the thirteenth of

May, is constituted by their Excellencies Senhores Drs. Pedro de Toledo,

Minister of Agriculture, Industry and Commerce, Raymondo Pereira da

Silva, Superintendent of the Rubber-Defence Department, Miguel Calmon du

Pin e Almeida, Representative of the National Agricultural Society, Jorge

Street, President of the Centro Industrial of Brazil, Julho Furtado,

Inspector of Forests, Gardens, Tree-planting, Hunting and Fishing of the

Federal District, Representative of the Municipal Prefecture and Candido

Mendes de Almeida, Director of the Commercial Museum of Rio de Janeiro,

Secretary General.

The site chosen for the exposition is in the Quinta de Boa Vista, perhaps

the most beautiful park of Rio de Janeiro.

The preparatory works, such as the ground-leveling, laying-out of

gardens, adoption of pavillions already existing, etc., is now already in

full course of being carried out.

The opportuneness of this event, the interest evinced in it by the

South and North and the United forces of the Institutions that form

the organizing commission, will secure a very considerable number of

exhibitors.

The month of May, one of the pleasantest months as regards temperature

in Rio de Janeiro, is the season chosen by those who desire to visit the

beautiful capital and thus the gathering of visitors to the exhibition

will certainly be notable.

Thus appears certain the most brilliant success for the Rubber Exhibition

of Rio de Janeiro.

RUBBER EXPORTERS

ESTADO DO AMAZONAS—MANÁOS

A. Santos Cardoso

Ahlers & Co.

Armazens Andresen

Albert H. Alden, Limited

Barbosa Tocantins

De Lagotellerie & Co.

E. Kingdon & Co.

Gruner & Co.

Gordon & Co.

J. G. Araujo

J. H. Barros

Leite & Co.

Mesquita & Co.

R. Suarez & Co.

Semper & Co.

Scholtz Hartze & Co.

Theodor Levy & Co.

ESTADO DO PARÁ

A. Meirelles & Co.

A. de la Reviere & Co.

Alves Braga & Co. Boulevard da Republica 34

Adelbert H. Alden, Ltd. Boulevard da Republica 32

A. A. Antunes & Co. Rua da Industria 27 e 29

Barboza & Tocantins Rua 13 de Maio 21 e 23

Braga Sobrinho & Co. Caixa do Correio 353

Coutinho & Co.

Candido José Rodrigues Rua Senador Manoel Barata

De Lagotellerie & Co. Boulevard da Republica 24

E. Pinto Alves & Co.

Gumer & Co.

Gordon & Co.

Guilherme Augusto de Mendonça Rua da Industria 43

I. Serfaty & Co.

Jeronymo C. Botelho

José Furtado de Mendonça

J. Marques Braga Travessa Campos Salles

Leite & Co.

Mello & Co. Boulevard da Republica 37

Pereira Bessa & Co. Rua 15 de Novembro 30

Pires Teixeira & Co. Travessa Marquez de Pombal 8

Pinho & Costa

Pereira Lemos & Co. Rua 13 de Maio 46

Raymundo Vieira Lima

Rocha Silva & Co.

R. Ahlers & Co.

R. Suarez & Co. Rua da Industria 59

Santos Amaral & Co.

Cunock Schrader & Co. Boulevard da Republica 36

D. Costa & Co. Boulevard da Republica 25

H. A. Astlett & Co. Praça Visconde Rio Branco 20

J. Marques Boulevard da Republica 7

Neale & Staats Praça Visconde do Rio Branco

Sluglehurst Brocklehurst & Co. Rua da Industria 5

ESTADO DA BAHIA—S. SALVADOR

Ulmann & Co. Rua das Princezas 12

F. Benn & Co.

F. Stevenson & Co.

Hesse & Co.

Hirsch, Hes & Co. Cães do Ouro 27

L. Costa & Co. Caixa do Correio 133

Ottens & Co.

Rosbach Brazil Company Rua Corpo Santo

S. S. Schindler

ESTADO DO MARANHÃO—S. LUIZ

Jorge & Santos

Joaquim Julio Correia & Co. Rua da Estrella 25

Francisco Freitas & Co.

Oliveira Neves & Co.

Currha Santos & Co. Rua Portugal 28

ESTADO DE MATTO GROSSO—CUYABÁ

Almeida & Co.

Alexandre Ador & Co.

Figueiredo & Oliveira

Lucas Borges & Co.

Orlando Irmãos & Co.

Ponce Azevedo & Co.

CORUMBÁ

Yosetti & Co.

Pereira Sobrinho & Co.

Wanderley Bais & Co.

Pasques Fillio & Co.

S. LUIZ DE CACERES

Benedicto R. Villas Boas

Joao Campos Vidal

José Dulce & Co.

Manoel Pedroso da Silva Bouden

MINISTERIUM OF AGRICULTURE, INDUSTRY

AND COMMERCE

BRAZIL

FEDERAL LAW AND REGULATIONS

COVERING THE PROTECTION AND

DEVELOPMENT OF THE RUBBER

INDUSTRY IN BRAZIL

Decree No. 2,542A of January 5, 1912 and

Decree No. 9,521 of April 17, 1912

PUBLISHED BY THE BRAZILIAN COMMISSIONER

THIRD INTERNATIONAL RUBBER AND ALLIED TRADES EXHIBITION

NEW YORK, 1912

[Illustration: HEVEA BRASILIENSIS.]

ACT OF CONGRESS

Decree No. 2542A of January 5, 1912

Establishing measures destined to facilitate and develop the culture of

rubber, Caucho, Maniçoba and Mangabeira, and the gathering and treatment

of the rubber extracted from these trees, and authorizing the executive

power not only to open the credits necessary to carry out these measures,

but also to contract such loans as may be necessary for that purpose.

The President of the Republic of the United States of Brazil:

Hereby makes known that the National Congress decreed and I hereby

sanction the following resolution:

Art. 1.—All utensils and materials destined for the culture of rubber

(seringueira), Caucho, Maniçoba and Mangabeira and for the collecting or

treatment of rubber extracted from these trees, whether for the purpose

of extracting or experimenting, shall be admitted free of all custom

house duties, including fees.

Only Section.—This exemption will have to be requisitioned of the

inspectors at custom houses, who will grant it without delay after

verifying the right of those seeking this favor.

Art. 2.—Premiums will be granted to those who start regular and entirely

new plantations of Seringueira, Caucho, Maniçoba or Mangabeira, or

replant old forests of Seringueira, Caucho, Maniçoba or Mangabeira, as

soon as the plantation has taken place, and will be paid on the following

conditions:

(a) For groups of 12 hectares (about 30 acres) of new culture, 2,500

milreis if seringueira; 1,500 milreis if caucho or maniçoba; 900 milreis

if mangabeira.

(b) For groups of 25 hectares, the replanting of native seringueira,

caucho, maniçoba or mangabeira, 2,000 milreis; for the first, 1,000

milreis; for the second and third, and 720 milreis for the fourth kind.

Section 1. These premiums will be payable one year before the first

gathering, when it is shown that the ground is entirely cultivated and

the trees well cared for.

Sec. 2. An increase of 5 per cent will be given annually in addition

to the premium offered planters of seringa rubber (to count from the

beginning of the planting), who prove that they have cultivated between

the rows in all the ground planted, plants of alimentation or of

industrial use.

Art. 3. The Government will establish, at a selected convenient point,

an experimental station, or field for demonstrating the culture of

seringueira in the Territory of Acre, in each of the States of Matto

Grosso, Amazonas, Pará, Maranhão, Piauhy and Bahia, and for the culture

of maniçoba jointly with mangabeira, in each of the States of Piauhy,

Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte, or Pernambuco, Bahia, Minas Geraes, São

Paulo, Goyaz, Paraná and Matto Grosso.

These stations will furnish gratuitously, selected seed to all those

interested, also instructions as to the most practical and economic

methods of culture and will supply information concerning general

results, which will be verified at the end of each year.

Art. 4.—In addition to the indirect favors which are mentioned in Art. 1

and others which may seem reasonable and necessary, the Government will

grant the right of premiums of encouragement, up to the sum of 400,000

milreis to the first plant established for refining the seringa rubber,

that reduces the different qualities to a uniform type and superior to

that exported and which may be established in each of the cities of Belém

(Pará), and Manáos; up to 100,000 milreis to the first refining plant of

maniçoba and mangabeira rubber, that accomplishes the same purpose and is

established in each of the States of Piauhy, Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte,

Pernambuco, Bahia, Minas Geraes and São Paulo; and up to 500,000 milreis

to the first factory of rubber articles which shall be established in

Manáos, Belém (Pará), Recife (Pernambuco), Bahia and Rio de Janeiro.

Only Section.—In order to have the right to the benefit of the above

article it is necessary for the factory to have actually employed a

capital four times as great as the value of the premium.

Art. 5.—The Government will put up three buildings to house immigrants,

to be of sufficient capacity and internally arranged, the same as

those on Flores Island. In Belém, Manáos, at an appropriate place in

the Territory of Acre, and also at places in the Valley of the Amazon,

where they are considered to be the most necessary, hospitals are to be

erected, surrounded by small agricultural colonies where the sick can be

received for treatment, be vaccinated gratuitously, and where medicines

of the first quality are kept for sale, especially sulphate of quinine.

Pamphlets containing suggestions about hygiene, prevention of the

diseases of that region and the practical remedies to use in the absence

of a physician, will be distributed freely.

The superintendence of these stations will be maintained by the Federal

Government, but the hospitals will be entrusted to professionals of

recognized ability, under a subvention or other favors, which the

Government considers reasonable and rules will be enforced which will

secure their proper regulation.

[Illustration: “SERINGUEIRA” HEVEA BRASILIENSIS. MULL, ARG. (11).]

Art. 6.—For the purpose of facilitating transportation and reducing its

cost in the valley of the Amazon, the Government will cause to be made,

as soon as possible, the following improvements:

1. The construction by the Government of narrow gauge railroads along the

Rivers Xingú, Tapajos and others in Pará, Matto Grosso, and of the Rio

Negro and Rio Branco and others in Amazonas, through the valleys through

which they flow, in accordance with the authorization of Congress, Law

No. 1,126, December 13, 1903, at the price fixed per kilometer, according

to the difficulties of the region, at the discretion of the Government.

In case the State of Pará and Amazonas should contract for the

construction of some of these railroads, the Federal Government for the

more rapid completion of the work will concede an increase of 15 contos

per kilometer.

2. The construction of a railroad, which, parting at a convenient point

of the Madeira-Mamoré Railroad, near the mouth of the River Abunã, passes

by the village Rio Branco, and at a point between Senna Madureira and

Caty, and terminates in the village Thaumaturgo, with a branch to the

frontier of Perú, by the valley of the Purús River.

The construction of this road shall be in accordance with the provisions

of Law No. 1,126, of December 13, 1903. As soon as the first section

of the trunk line is inaugurated to the village of Rio Branco, the

Government will install a custom house at Porto Velho on the Madeira

River and announce this port open to commerce with friendly nations.

3. Construction of a railroad starting at the port of Belém of Pará and

joining the net work of railroads of Central Brazil at Pirapóra, in the

State of Minas Geraes, and of Northern Brazil at Coroatá, in the State

of Maranhão, with the necessary branch lines to join the initial points

or terminals of navigation on the Rivers Araguaya, Tocantins, Parahyba

and S. Francisco. The railroad shall be built according to the provisions

of Law No. 1,126, December 13, 1903, and shall be leased by public

competition.

4. The execution of the works necessary for the effective navigation, at

any season of the year, of steamers drawing three feet of water; on the

Rio Negro, between Santa Isabel and Cucuhy; on the Rio Branco, from its

mouth to Fort S. Joaquim; on the River Purús, from Hyutanahan to Senna

Madureira; on the River Acre from its mouth to Riosinho das Pedras.

The Government may contract for the execution of these works by public

competition, or independent of competition, with one or more individuals

or firms offering sufficient guaranty, applying the provisions

established by the decree, No. 6,368, February 14, 1907, or others, which

will not impose greater burdens, and which may be more economic.

Art. 7.—For the same purpose as mentioned in the previous article, all

vessels of any kind destined for river navigation, are declared exempt

from all custom house duties, including fees, revision, rates.

Art. 8.—The Government will grant the same exemption in addition to the

indirect favors found convenient, to the contractor who will bind himself

at a public competition, to establish coal depots at points in the valley

of the Amazon previously indicated, and to supply steamers and launches

with fuel at prices approved by the Government.

Art. 9.—The Government will promote and aid the production of food stuffs

in the valley of the Amazon through the following measures, or others

which may be found convenient and promise satisfactory results.

1. The leasing of two of the National Reservations on the Rio Branco,

at a public auction or private competition to a reliable concern, which

binds itself to develop on a large scale, the breeding of cattle of

improved types, the production of cereals, and other foodstuffs, to

establish packing houses, dairies, rice-shelling mills, flour and mandiok

mills, etc.

2. Direct colonization, through the Federal Government, on lands still

belonging to the Union, on the S. Marcos Reservation, situated between

the Rivers Mahú, Takutú, Surumú and Cotingo, with native families of

farmers and stock-farmers, with a view of developing and increasing the

production of foodstuffs, as well as horses and mules.

3. Concession to concerns which propose to establish large plantations or

colonies under the above mentioned conditions, one in the Territory of

Acre (between the Rio Branco and Xapury), one in the State of Amazonas

(in the region of the Autaz River), and one in the State of Pará (on the

island of Marajó or other point more convenient on the lower Amazon),

granting them the following favors:

(a) Exemption from all import duties, including fees, for all material

imported, necessary for establishing the plantation, including buildings,

corrals, pastures, fences, watering places, agricultural implements and

machines for the cultivation, harvesting and treatment of cereals, the

installation of factories treating dairy produce and packing houses, as

well as cattle and seed which may be imported during the first five years

after the plantation is started.

(b) Premiums of 30,000 milreis for lots of 1,000 hectares of cultivated

pasture, planted and conveniently fenced, and of 100,000 milreis for

lots of 1,000 hectares of improved land for farming and actually planted

with rice, beans, corn or mandioca.

(c) A premium of 100,000 milreis for lots of 500 tons of products made

from milk, packed meats and dried beef, which were produced within five

years.

4. Exemption from all import duties, including that of fees, for the

vessels, instruments, machinery, drugs and ingredients necessary for

the installation and working, for a period of 15 years, of a fishing

enterprise, including the salting and preserving of fish, that may be

established on the Amazon rivers, and the concession of a premium of

10:000$ for five consecutive years, when the production of salted and

preserved fish shall be above 100 tons annually.

Art. 10.—The Government shall proceed to the discrimination, and

consequent acknowledgment of the owners of the lands in the Territory of

Acre, for the confirmation of their respective property titles.

Section 1.—In the verification the following should be considered as much

as possible:

(a) The titles granted by the Governors of the States of the Amazon, of

Bolivia and the former independent State of Acre before the treaty of

Petropolis.

(b) The mild and pacific possessions acquired by first occupation, or

from the first occupant, which shall be found in active exploration,

or with its beginnings and habitual residence of the possessor, or his

representatives.

Sec. 2.—The maximum area of each lot shall be 10 kilometers square.

Sec. 3.—The Government will review the arrangements of Law, No. 601,

September 18, 1850, and Decree No. 1,318, January 30, 1854, expediting a

new regulation of lands, with the modifications of the present law and

those which appear more convenient to the actual situation of the Federal

territories.

Art. 11.—Every three years, the Government shall promote the realization,

in Rio de Janeiro, of an exposition embracing all that pertains to

the national rubber industry, and on these occasions it will grant

premiums of encouragement, totaling an amount equal to that which shall

be authorized by law of the budget in force, for the best processes of

culture and treatment, and to the producers of the best manufactured

articles.

Art. 12.—The Executive Power is authorized to enter into an agreement

with the States of Pará, Amazonas and Matto Grosso, for the purpose of

obtaining an annual reduction of 10 per cent until the maximum limit of

50 per cent of the actual value of the export duties placed by the States

upon the seringa rubber produced in their territories, and the exemption

from any export duty, for the space of 25 years, to begin from the date

of this law, upon rubber of the same quality and derivation which may be

gathered from cultivated seringaes.

At the time the agreement is effected, the executive power shall issue a

decree making such reduction which the States may make in the export duty

collected on the rubber of the Federal Territory of Acre and conceding an

equal exemption upon cultivated rubber.

Art. 13.—In addition the Government is authorized to enter into

an agreement with the above mentioned States for the purpose of

establishing, in relation to the rubber of the Territory of Acre, the

measures of protection and defense, which they have adopted in relation

to the production, or other measures which may be thought better, and

having the power to issue the decrees necessary for this purpose.

Art. 14.—For the entire execution of this law and the realization of

the measures decreed, the executive power shall issue, as quickly as

possible, the necessary regulations; it shall open each year the credits

that may be necessary, rendering an account to the Legislative power the

year following, of the amounts expended, of the work done, of the results

obtained and making the operations of credit which such services and

measures demand.

Art. 15.—All laws contrary to this are revoked.

Rio de Janeiro, January 5, 1912, 91st year of Independence and the 24th

year of the Republic.

HERMES R. da FONSECA,

PEDRO de TOLEDO.

Order according to Federal Law, number 2,543A, Jan. 5, 1912

Decree number 9,521, April 17, 1912

Art. 1. The measures and services created by law number 2,543A, Jan. 5 of

the present year, for the economic defense of rubber, has in view:

1. The encouragement of the extractive and cultivating industry of the

principal trees producing rubber.

2. The creation of the refining and manufacturing industry of rubber

articles.

3. Assistance to immigrants, native and foreign, recently arrived, and to

the laborers already established in the valley of the Amazon.

4. To facilitate transportation and decrease its cost in the valley of

the Amazon.

5. To create central producers of alimentary foodstuffs in the valley of

the Amazon.

6. To discriminate and legalize the possessors of lands in the Federal

Territory of Acre.

7. To hold triennial expositions in Rio de Janeiro, embracing everything

that relates to the national rubber industry.

8. To authorize agreements with the States producing seringa rubber, for

decreasing the duties of exportation and for the protection and aid of

the rubber commerce.

Sole Paragraph. It shall be the object of each of these measures and

means referred to in number 8 and of the special rules, that they shall

publish at opportune times, as well as those referred to in number 6 and

that part of number 4 which speaks of the revision and consolidation of

the regulations of the coast-wise merchant marine.

TITLE I

The means of encouragement of the extractive and cultivating industry of

the principal rubber producing trees

CHAPTER I

The reduction of the cost of implements and materials employed in the

development of the rubber industry

Art. 2. The implements and regular materials in the list annexed to

this regulation, are free of all import duties, including the fees

when employed for the cultivation of seringueira, caucho, maniçoba and

mangabeira and the improved collection of the extracted rubber, from

these trees, whether it treats of the development purely extractive, or

of the development of cultivation.

Sole Paragraph. Materials and machinery which shall be discovered or

invented during the time this regulation is in force, which have special

application to the rubber industry, shall enjoy the same exemption from

import duties.

Art. 3. The exemption shall be quickly granted by the custom house

inspectors, from whom the claimants should require it, uniting all, or

only those necessary as the case may be, the following documents:

1. The last receipt of the duty of declarations of the Municipality or

Mayor to whose jurisdiction it pertains, by which is proven that the

claimant is developing on his own or rented property, the extractive or

cultivating rubber industry, or that he is a merchant established with a

house prepared for goods for rubber gatherers, when it treats of regular

objects of the first group.

2. Attested by the Municipality or Mayor to whose jurisdiction he

belongs, that the claimant possesses proper land and that he is about to

effectively undertake the culture of some of the trees above mentioned

and treatment of their rubber or an authentic copy of the concession

for this purpose, which he may have obtained from the Minister of

Agriculture, in case he treats of regular objects of the second, third or

fourth group.

[Illustration: CASTILLÔA ELASTICA.]

3. A detailed statement of the kind and quality of objects or material

which it is necessary to import, or has been imported, which it is

necessary to despatch.

Sole Paragraph. The importer shall become responsible, during this

period, to the exchequer for any errors that may have been made.

Art. 4. The product, drug or object that may be similar to that produced

in this country, will not be exempt from import duties, when the cost in

this market in which he would have to buy it was equal to that of the

imported merchandise, less the value of the import duty which he would

have to pay in the custom houses.

CHAPTER II

The money premiums offered to those who cultivate the principal rubber

producing trees

Art. 5. To every one who makes an entirely new culture of Seringueira,

caucho, maniçoba or mangabeira, or replants seringaes, maniçobaes,

couchaes or native mangabaes, shall be given, in the first case and

for groups of 12 hectares, premiums of 2,500 milreis, when it is

Seringueira; 1,500 milreis when caucho or maniçoba, and 900 milreis

when mangabeira—and in the second case and for groups of 25 hectares,

2,000 milreis when it is seringueiras, 1,000 milreis when couchaes or

maniçobas and 720 milreis when mangabaes, when the following conditions

are observed:

1. Sending beforehand to the Minister of Agriculture a plan of the

property in which he expects to make the culture, indicating the area,

water courses navigable for steamers, launches or only canoes, and of

the means of access from headquarters to the port (fluvial or maritime)

or the nearest station on the railroad, mentioning these respective

distances in case the property is situated in the interior. The plan

shall be accompanied by a descriptive memorandum, containing as much

detailed description as possible as to the nature of the soil and its

adaptation to what shall be principally cultivated, and to those which

may advantageously be subsidiary; the production of rubber for the last

three years in case it treats of the property in development, and about

the conditions of healthfulness.

2. It shall declare whether it is new culture or replanting that is

proposed to be done and in the second case the number of trees in

development the property has already.

3. When the cultivation is of Seringueiras one must declare whether

he expects to make parallel cultivations or not, specifying which and

whether they occupy the land planted to rubber, or land separate.

4. To communicate to the official charged with the fiscalization the

beginning and ending of the planting, with the necessary antecedence,

the year in which the first harvest will be gathered, facilitating the

examination of the property at any time, and as many times as desired.

Art. 6. The least number of trees per hectare for new culture shall be

250 for seringueira and caucho, and 400 for maniçoba and mangabeira. In

the event of replanting, when possible, the distance between the trees

should be 6 to 6.50 metres for seringueiras and caucho, and 5 metres for

maniçoba and mangabeira.

Art. 7. To those who cultivate with seringueiras plants of alimentation

or industrial utility, in all the land improved, or in other land equal

to one-third of the dimensions of the first, there will be conferred

annually, from the beginning of the cultivation to the year of the first

rubber harvest, a supplementary premium corresponding in value to 5 per

cent of the principal premium.

Art. 8. Premiums will not be paid for principal or subsidiary cultures

which in the final inspections for the first and the annual inspections

for the others, the trees show poor treatment or they contain an amount

exceeding 15 per cent of flaws.

Art. 9. The premiums shall be paid directly by the Delegacia Fiscal of

the State where the property is situated, in the preceding first harvest

of rubber, through the demand of the claimant, with certificate from the

Government inspector, declaring that all the conditions required in this

regulation were faithfully complied with.

Sole Paragraph. The inspector who makes out the certificate shall

immediately notify the Minister and will be held responsible at all times

for the value of the premium paid, in case his information should be

found false in whole or in part.

Art. 10. At sight of the documents spoken of in Art. 5, and after

examining them, the claimant shall be entered ex-officio in the general

register of farmers, existing in the General Directory of Agriculture

with the advantages and guarantees it offers him.

CHAPTER III

The Experimental Stations for the culture of rubber

Art. 11. The experimental stations for the culture of seringueira in

the Territory of Acre and the States of Matto-Grosso, Amazonas, Pará,

Maranhão, Piauhy and Bahia, and for the culture of maniçoba jointly with

that of mangabeira, in the States of Piauhy, Ceará, Pernambuco, Bahia,

Minas Geraes, S. Paulo, Goyaz, Paraná and Matto Grosso, have in view

with the experimental study of all the factors relating to the regional

culture of each of these trees, for the purpose of furnishing the

cultivators with precise data for the adoption of methods and processes,

which will make possible the economic and perfect production of their

respective rubber.

Art. 12. The experimental stations shall be established on lands that

possess the following requisites:

1. Climatic situation and agricultural conditions required by the nature

or quality of the plant to be cultivated.

2. The physical constitution and natural chemical composition which will

permit conjunctly and parallel the culture of the principal food stuffs

or plants of industrial utility.

3. Localization at points easily accessible by good roads so that they

can be visited and verified, as well in the fields as in the books of

registry of the farmers and agricultural accounts of the practical

results and economies of the different services and operations. The

existence of permanent water courses, or dams with sufficient capacity to

guarantee irrigation when necessary, and also other agricultural services.

Art. 13. The total area of each experimental station shall be from 80

to 100 hectares, so that there can be made at the same time in distinct

partial areas the culture of the portions destined for experiments

relative to each kind of tree and a demonstration of the normal

systematic development of the respective culture, for comparison of the

products and their revenue.

Art. 14. In the area reserved for demonstration, there shall be included

those which will serve as examples, being the first cultivated between

the processes that shall have proven the most advantageous and which are

sought to be introduced, and lastly of those generally adopted in that

region.

Art. 15. In each station there shall be reserved the land necessary for

the establishment of a nursery of fruit trees and the production of

selected seeds of alimentary plants or those of industrial utility, whose

culture along with the principal plant shall be considered advantageous.

Art. 16. Every experimental station shall have the following

installations:

1. A physiological vegetable laboratory, the proving of seeds and

phytopathology.

2. Laboratory of agricultural entomology.

3. Laboratory of agricultural, vegetable and bromatological chemistry.

[Illustration: FUMIGATING CAOUTCHOUC.]

4. Laboratory of microbiological and technical agriculture.

5. An agricultural and floral museum.

6. A corridor for machines.

7. A meteorological station.

Sole Paragraph. A station that may be established in a region where

there already exists a federal institution of similar kind, pertaining

to agriculture in general, the installations above mentioned shall

be reduced to numbers 5, 6, and 7 and shall be provided with a small

laboratory for the mechanical analysis of the soil, and utensils and

instruments necessary for the proving of seeds of useful vegetables,

so that a choice or selection may be made and their identity, purity,

quality and germinating energy may be verified, including in these

experiments those which refer to plants that are injurious.

Art. 17. To accomplish the ends proposed, the experimental stations ought

to:

1. Attend the consultations that may be held upon any agricultural

question in their line.

2. Execute gratuitously analysis of fertilizers, spices, plants and

water, when required by the nearest federal institute, when it does not

possess the necessary laboratories.

3. Distribute selected plants and seeds.

4. Study the diseases common to the plants cultivated and the means of

combating them, and explaining these things to those interested.

5. To publish yearly and distribute free of charge a bulletin devoted to

the relation of the works done and the useful knowledge acquired relative

to agricultural and rural industrial subjects, and especially the results

obtained as to the most practical and economic method of cultivating the

trees that produce rubber, and the most profitable subsidiary plants, as

well as the best methods of the treatment, conservation and packing of

the products.

Art. 18. There shall be admitted to the experimental stations, persons

who wish to gain a practical knowledge in any of the sections, at the

discretion of the Director, who shall fix the number of students in

agreement with the chief of the respective section.

Sole Paragraph. On equal terms, apprentices between 15 and 18 years of

age, shall be admitted, the numbers to be determined by the respective

Director, with the approval of the Minister, who shall have daily tasks

corresponding to their capacity and aptitude. The Director in the name

of the Minister shall give a certificate, on which shall be indicated

the work that has been done, to all those who have completed their

apprenticeship.

Art. 19. The plan of each station shall be organized to meet the peculiar

necessities of the zone in which it may be established, conserving,

however, the principal fundamentals already set forth.

Art. 20. The position of Director shall be held by a person who is a

specialist in any one of the technical sections, and at the same time

shall be its chief, an indispensable condition being that in addition to

his technical knowledge he shall have had a practical apprenticeship.

Art. 21. The technical positions may be filled, by contract, by native or

foreign professors of established ability.

Art. 22. To each of the stations there shall be sent a special regulation

determining for them their proportions according to the necessities of

the case, fixing the term and salaries of their respective personnel and

providing for the special necessities to come.

TITLE II

The creation of the Refining and Manufacturing Rubber Industries

ONLY CHAPTER

Art. 23. The first factory for the refining of seringa rubber that shall

be established in each of the cities of Belém (Pará) and Manáos, and of

maniçoba and mangabeira rubber which shall be established in the States

of Piauhy, Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte, Pernambuco, Bahia, Minas Geraes

and S. Paulo, as well as the first factory of rubber articles which shall

be established in Manáos, in Belém, in Recife (Pernambuco) in Bahia, and

in Rio de Janeiro, there shall be conceded the following premiums and

favors:

(a) Up to 400,000 milreis in money to the plants for the refining of

seringa rubber;

Up to 100,000 milreis in money to the plants for the refining of maniçoba

and mangabeira rubber;

Up to 500,000 milreis in money for plants for manufacturing rubber

articles.

(b) Exemption from import duties, including fees in the manner and by

the processes described in Articles 3 and 91 combined, as the case may

require, for all material, machines, utensils and hardware necessary for

the construction and complete equipment of the factory, as well as all

chemical substances, cloth and different materials, combustibles and

lubricants necessary for the working and maintenance of the factory,

during a period of 25 years.

(c) The right of appropriation for public use, according to the

legislation in force, of the lands and improvements belonging to

individuals that may be judged appropriate and necessary for the

equipment of the factory and its dependencies.

(d) A preference given by the Government for the purchase of the

products used in the service of the Army and Navy and the federal public

departments, which shall be manufactured by the factories, when they

can compete in quality with similar foreign articles—the contract for

furnishing the same, adjudicated every 3 years with each factory, for

those of their products which were classified in the first place in the

expositions mentioned in Article 95.

(e) Exemption from all State and Municipal duties for the same time as

in letter b, because the factory is considered to be of service to the

Government.

Art. 24. In order to claim these favors any company or organization that

expects to erect one or more factories, should conform to the following

formalities and conditions:

1. Present to the Minister of Agriculture a previous request accompanied

by the following documents:

(a) General and detailed plan of the factories;

(b) An estimate of the expenses for the first establishment;

(c) A descriptive memorandum in which the capacity of production of the

factory is declared the principal articles intended to be manufactured,

the lowest price for which it is proposed to wash and refine rubber,

which should be reduced, for each quality, to one type and superior for

exportation, in general giving the Government all the information that

will help it to form a correct opinion as to the nature and importance of

the projected establishment;

(d) Certificates and references which will prove the complete

professional and financial ability of the suitor.

2. To obligate himself in the contract made with the Minister of

Agriculture, the clause of reversion at the end of the combined term.

3. To allow the official appointed by the Government for the

fiscalization, to visit the works during the period of construction, for

the purpose of verifying the actual amount of expenses incurred for the

first establishment and determining the value of the pecuniary premium,

which shall be in any of the three cases, equal to a fourth part of the

expense, not exceeding the limits fixed in letter a of Article 23, as

well as to visit the establishment when he desires after it begins work,

in order that he may be sure, that the materials imported free of duty

are effectively and exclusively used in the products of the factory.

4. To send annually to the Minister, through the said fiscal a prepared

statement in which shall be specified:

(a) The amount and quality and the place where produced of the rubber

used as raw material;

(b) The kind and quantity and value of the products of the factory used

at home and exported;

(c) The number of employes, native and foreign, effectively in service

during the year, with specification of their respective classes.

Art. 25. The premium in money shall be paid, as soon as the factory is

inaugurated, at the National Treasury or at the Delegacia Fiscal of

the State in which it is situated, when authorized by the Minister of

Agriculture.

TITLE III

Assistance to immigrants, native or recently arrived foreigners and

laborers already established in the valley of the Amazon.

CHAPTER I

The Lodges for immigrants in Belém, Manáos and the Territory of Acre

Art. 26. The lodges for immigrants in Belém, Manáos and the Territory of

Acre, shall be establishments installed and maintained at the expense

of the Union, intended to entertain immigrants, native and foreign, who

arrive at those ports voluntarily or with their passage paid by the Union

or by the States.

Art. 27. The lodges at Belém shall have the capacity of caring for at

least 1,500, that at Manáos 1,200 and that at Acre 800 immigrants.

Art. 28. The plan of the respective buildings and the different

installations of the lodges shall conform rigorously to the conditions

required by the climate of that region and fitted for the special

necessities of service for which they are intended.

Art. 29. The construction shall be made by a public bidding.

Sole Paragraph. If the first public bidding is not satisfactory, the

Government can order the projected lodge built by the Administration.

Art. 30. Annexed to each lodge there shall be an appropriate building,

in which there shall be a special receiver of customs for the implements

of workmen employed in agricultural and extractive industries, and

indispensable for the carrying on of their work these implements to be

sold strictly at cost price to those immigrants who desire to buy for

their personal use.

To those native immigrants who during the times of drought in the States

of the northwest and going from there, may arrive at the lodges without

resources, shall be furnished free, by authority of the Minister, with

the implements indispensable for work.

Art. 31. The families of native and foreign immigrants arriving at the

lodges of Belém and Manáos, who do not expressly declare they prefer

another destination, shall be transported at the expense of the Union or

the lessee to the national plantations of Rio Branco, where according to

their aptitude and ability, they shall be settled in colonies, founded by

this one or that one.

Art. 32. At the inauguration of each lodge, there shall be applied, with

the modifications required by the special conditions of each case, the

regulations of the lodge on the island of Flores.

CHAPTER II

Hospitals in the Interior

Art. 33. For the purpose of reducing the distances and the time of the

journey for the inhabitants of the interior in the valley of the Amazon,

who must find a centre of supplies where they can be treated when sick,

or provide excellent medicines for their domestic ills; of proportioning

to all who may desire means of immuning themselves against contagious

diseases, and of creating a propaganda service of the hygienic habits

and practices necessary for everyone who must live and work in the

Amazon regions, there shall be built a hospital surrounded by a small

agricultural colony in Boa Vista do Rio Branco; S. Gabriel do Rio Negro;

Teffé or Fonte Boa on the River Solimões; S. Felippe, on the River Juruá;

Bocca do Acre, on the River Purús; at the confluence of the Rivers Arinos

and Juruéna; on the Alto Tapajóz; Conceição on the River Araguaya and

Montenegro on the Amapá.

Art. 34. The hospitals shall be built in places that have the following

requisites:

1. To have a plain of low elevation, conveniently ventilated for the

construction of the hospital buildings so-called and its dependencies,

and houses of residence for the personnel.

2. Existence around or close to the plain of dry lands, provided with

good and abundant water, which serve for agriculture and cattle raising

and of sufficient area for the founding of an agricultural community of

at least 100 families.

3. Facility for the establishment of rapid communication with a fluvial

port, or one that must serve them.

Art. 35. Each hospital shall have a capacity for 100 sick persons.

Art. 36. Each hospital shall possess the following installations:

(a) Five separate pavilions, each for 20 sick, each sick person having 5

cubic metres and an area of 12 square metres.

One of the pavilions should be installed with the necessary requisites

for the isolation of infectious diseases; for this purpose it should be

divided into rooms for isolation, independent and easily disinfected,

with the proper sanitary apparatus.

All the hospital buildings should have the windows protected by wire

screening whose openings should never exceed 1½ millimeter and the doors

provided with:

(b) A disinfectory provided with an apparatus to disinfect in boiling lye

and a stove for sterilization by the combined action of heat, vacuum and

formal. Annexed to the disinfectory shall be the laundry.

(c) A laboratory for the diagnostic clinics and microbiology.

(d) Surgical operating room.

(e) Clinic consulting room.

(f) Room for autopsies.

(g) Pharmacy.

(h) Sanitary installation, in which should terminate all the drainage

pipes of the hospital, destined for the bacteriological treatment of the

water used, which not until after this operation must be allowed to flow

into the natural river courses.

(i) Dependencies for the administration and quarters of the personnel.

Art. 37. In each hospital there shall be made in the respective

pharmaceutical laboratory a preliminary study of all the remedies used

by the people of that region to determine which are prejudicial and

which inoffensive. The respective Director shall show the people in

printed circulars, frequently and profusely distributed that their

use is improper. Those which are found efficacious and susceptible of

improvement, shall be sent for more complete studies in the chemical

laboratories and federal pharmacies, letting the people know the results

obtained.

Art. 38. When the installation of each hospital is complete, a contract

shall be made, by public bidding, or independent of it, as the Government

may think best, with some professional of recognized ability, the

direction and maintenance of the respective services, the contract

including the following obligations:

1. The reservation of one hour daily in the medical consultation room,

where the sick known to be without means may freely receive examination

and be furnished with the necessary medicines.

2. The maintenance of a bureau for vaccination against smallpox and

other contagious diseases by means considered efficacious, and to attend

gratuitously to all who may wish it.

3. To submit for the approval of the Government the regimen internal of

the establishment and a table of prices for the treatment of the sick,

which should be revised every 3 years.

4. To expose for sale in the pharmacy only medicines of the best quality,

especially sulphate of quinine and such other preparations, under penalty

of having destroyed all drugs known to be impure in addition to the fine

to suit the case that may be fixed in the contract.

5. To give a bond in money, or policies of the public federal debt that

will guarantee the good conservation of the establishment during the time

of the contract.

6. To distribute abundantly every six months leaflets containing advice

about hygiene prevention of the sicknesses of that region, showing in

clear language, within the reach of all, those that are improper and the

danger in the use of alcoholic drinks, and teaching what measures to take

and the common remedies which should be applied in different cases when

there is no physician to be had.

7. To be subject to the inspection of the Government which should be very

minute and severe as to the condition of cleanliness and conservation of

the establishment, the quality of the medicines employed and sold to the

public and the care with which the sick are treated.

Art. 39. The hospitals and all their dependencies and sections are not

subject to any duties to the state or municipality, being the property of

the Union and doing a federal public service.

Art. 40. To each hospital there shall be given an annual pecuniary

subvention, proportioned to the services to which it will have to attend,

until the income of the establishment and all its dependencies derive

a profit of 10 per cent, during 3 consecutive years on the respective

capital invested, which amount shall be acknowledged and previously

approved by the Government.

CHAPTER III

The agricultural nucleuses adjacent to the hospitals

Art. 41. The agricultural nucleuses adjacent to the interior hospital

shall be founded by the Union for the following purposes:

1. The production of foodstuffs necessary for the support of the said

hospitals.

2. The intensive culture and breeding of the plants and animals of

alimentation generally consumed by the neighboring population.

3. The constituting of fixed centres of population economically

equipped, which will serve as a point of parting for colonies of greater

importance, capable of gradually attending to the necessities that the

growing population of that region may be creating.

Art. 42. The preliminary studies, the plan, the preparatory work and

the different installations necessary for the founding of each nucleus

as well as the colonization of the lots, and their administration in

general, shall be done in accordance with dispositions of decree number

9,081, Nov. 3, and number 9,214, Dec. 15, 1911, observing the following

alterations:

1. The selling price of rural and urban lots shall be calculated on the

prices established in the land laws of the States of Pará and Amazonas,

as a base, applicable to the nucleuses situated respectively in each

state:

2. In failure of remunerating work, or when there is insufficient, the

judge of the administration, to maintain numerous families, shall furnish

them food, charging the same to the heads of the families, calculating

this furnishing at the rate of from 2 milreis to 3 milreis daily at the

highest, for adults and those over 7 years of age, and one half this for

those between the age of 7 to 3 years.

Art. 43. The indians and native workers localized in the agricultural

nucleuses shall participate in the advantages and obligations contained

in decree number 9,214, Dec. 15, 1911.

Art. 44. Having finished the preparatory work for each nucleus, the lots

first colonized shall be those devoted to the production of the foods

necessary for the support of the hospital which is in their neighborhood,

so that it can count on, from the time of its inauguration, a regular and

sufficient supply of these commodities.

TITLE IV

Improvements and measures tending to facilitate transportation and

decrease its cost in the valley of the Amazon

CHAPTER I

Lines of railroad transportation

Art. 45. There shall be constructed in the valley of the Amazon lines of

railroad transportation of two classes:

1. Large lines of transportation, making an integral part of the general

line of Federal railroads, with identical characteristics and comprising

the same principles.

2. Economic lines of transportation, of reduced gauge, provisionally

established for easy ways of penetration, whatever may be their

development, sufficient to facilitate access to and permit the

exploration of the virgin seringas and the good lands for cultivation

situated on the upper banks of the Rivers Xingú, Tapajóz, Branco, Negro,

and others situated in the States of Pará, Matto-Grosso and Amazonas.

Art. 46. Those lines belonging to the first class shall be immediately

begun and constructed as quickly as possible, the following:

1. Parting from the Port of Belém (Pará) and joining the general line of

railroad in Pirapóra, in the State of Minas Geraes and in Coroatá, in

the State of Maranhão, with the necessary branches to unite the initial

points or terminals of navigation on the Rivers Arguaya, Tocantins,

Parnaluyba, and S. Francisco.

2. Beginning at a convenient point chosen on the Madeira-Mamoré railroad,

near the mouth of the River Abunã, passing by the Villa Rio Branco,

and the point most appropriate between Senna Medureira and Catay and

terminating in Villa Thaumaturgo, with a branch to the frontier of Perú

by the valley of the River Purús.

Art. 47. The rules for the construction of these lines is prescribed by

law, number 1,126, Dec. 15, 1903, and both shall be let at public bidding.

Art. 48. The Minister of Transportation is to command the studies to

be made, to contract for the construction and inspect the traffic of

these roads, but he will furnish the Minister of Agriculture a copy

of the plans relative to the route and give descriptive memoranda of

the project, and when drawing up the papers for the bidding, shall

include the clauses which he shall judge necessary and opportune for the

colonization of the bordering lands and the development of the industries

of the zone tributary to the line as well as to attend to the eventual

necessities of the commerce.

Art. 49. The construction and the concession for construction of the

roads of the second class may be made by the Union or by the States

interested.

Art. 50. The Minister of Agriculture is the proper person to construct or

permit the construction of those Government resolves to carry into effect

at the account of the Union, as well as to authorize the payment of the

subvention of 15,000 mibreis per kilometer to those which were contracted

for by the States.

Art. 51. The technical conditions of the railroads of which Art. 45

treats in the second part, are the following:

A portable line of the Decauville type.

Weight of the rails, 15 kilos per metre.

Gauge 0.60 cm between the rails, least radius of curvature 40 M. O.

Greatest incline OmO10.

Weight of locomotives 18 to 20 tons.

Art. 52. The concessions for these roads shall be let at a public bidding

according to the rule established in law number 1,126 of 1903, or

independently of bidding with a person or corporation sufficiently able

with the help of the payment of the maximum subvention of 25 contos per

kilometer, according to the difficulties of the land it passes through,

paid by sections of not less than 30 kilometers, completely ready and

furnished with the necessary rolling stock, within 90 days of the date of

the respective inaugurations.

Art. 53. The concession for these railroads cannot be given to those who

agree to build then simply as transportation enterprises, but only to

those who will obligate themselves to colonize and explore, in proportion

as they may be justified, the respective marginal lands.

It is an essential condition for the validity of the concession, that

the contractor presents to the Minister of Agriculture within the

maximum term of one year, proof that he has disposed of the lands for

colonization, and a descriptive memorandum of the character and extent of

the industries he intends to develop.

Art. 54. Those railroads of this type which in the future may be joined

to any general line of transportation, shall be obliged as soon as its

gross earnings amount to 10,000 mibreis per kilometer, to make its gauge

conform to the same, and from then for all purposes becoming a part of

the general federal transportation system.

Independently of being joined to any railroad in general, these

economical railroads shall pass to the jurisdiction of the Minister of

Transportation and Public Works and shall be obliged to enlarge their

gauge to 1 meter, without other favors from the Government, there not

being a supplementary term of the contract, if it is wanting for its

termination in less than 60 years, when the gross receipts have reached

15,000 mibreis per kilometer during 3 successive years. Before this the

railroad may pass to the Minister of Transportation and the gauge be

widened, on his own account, when he shall think it to his interest, or

by a new contract, when the Government thinks it necessary to have it

done for the necessities of the administration or the defense of the

country.

Art. 55. In addition to the subvention per kilometer, there shall be

given to these railroads all the indirect favors received by the other

railroads of the country.

Art. 56. The maximum term for a concession shall be 90 years, at the end

of which the railroad will revert to the control of the Union.

Art. 57. Under the right of experiment, the Government shall promote at

once the following lines of economical railroads:

1. Parting from “Antiga Souzel,” or other point more convenient on the

left bank of the Xingú and ascending the left side of the valley to the

margin of the River Cariahy, with a branch which parting at a convenient

point, shall go to the Tapajóz and ascend the right hand side of the

valley until it reaches the S. Manoel which may appear advantageous,

ascending the secondary valley and continuing to the dividing of the

waters of the two principal rivers.

2. Parting from the confluence of the River Negro with the Branco and by

the valley of the River Seruiny, gaining the right side of the valley

by the Caratimani river and continuing to the upper Uraricoera, with a

branch parting at a convenient point at the request of the upper Paduiry

and a branch in the direction of the Villa Boa Vista.

CHAPTER II

Improvements for the navigation of the Rivers Branco, Negro, Purús and

Acre

Art. 58. The improvements necessary for effective navigation at any

season of the year, for steamers drawing 3 feet, on the River Negro,

between Santa Izabel and Cucuhy, on the River Branco, from its mouth to

São Joaquin, on the River Purús, between Hyutanhã and Senna Madureira,

and on the River Acre, from its mouth to Riosinho de Pedros, shall be

contracted for by public bidding, or independently of bidding, with

corporations sufficiently able, under the rule established by decree,

number 6,368, Feb. 14, 1907 or others which may not be more onerous and

may permit the assurance of the opening of navigation more rapidly on the

sections of the rivers to be improved.

Art. 59. In none of the contracts shall a longer term than 7 years be

granted the contracting party, to count from the date of its signing, so

that safe and free passage is given steamers drawing 3 feet in the entire

distance of the contract.

Art. 60. The improvements in the Rio Branco, shall commence with the

destruction and regulating of the Cujubim rapid, so that from now on

navigation is assured during the Winter to Villa Boa Vista.

Art. 61. The studies, plans, constructions, inspection and direct

conservation of these works are under the supervision of the Minister of

Transportation; but before the respective contract is signed, copies of

the plans and descriptive memorandum referring to the project shall be

furnished the Minister of Agriculture, so that he may be heard upon the

opportunity and the order in which these works shall be executed, in the

interest of the economic development of the region, and that they may be

conveniently attended by those casually interested in the colonization

and development of the industries along the banks of the rivers, or in

commerce in general.

In case it is found that the destruction and regulation of the Cujubim

rapid cannot be done during one season of low water in the river, the

Minister of Agriculture, by agreement with the State of Amazonas, can

order to be constructed a Decauville line of the type described in

articles 45, second part and 51, in the belt line constructed by that

State along waterfalls, so that the leasing and colonization of the

national plantations of Rio Branco is no longer delayed.

CHAPTER III

Complementary measures

Art. 62. All vessels of every kind intended for the fluvial navigation

in the valley of the Amazon are free of all import duties, including the

fees. This exemption shall be given by the custom houses of Belém (Pará)

and Manáos, through a requisition to the Minister of Agriculture, which

the importer shall have asked for, declaring in his request the number,

class and tonnage, the draft and the cost and the purpose of each vessel.

Art. 63. The vessel imported under this favor, if sold outside the valley

of the Amazon, or even within it, to a foreign country, shall pay the

proper duties according to the law of the budget in force in the year of

its importation.

Art. 64. Deposits of coal shall be established for supplying the steamers

which navigate the Amazon rivers, and for others who care to use them, in

the following places, or in others which be shown to be more convenient:

Belém (Pará), Cametá, Breves, Chaves, Mazagão, Gurupá, Souzel, Prainha,

Sautarem, Ponta Nova Brasileira, Obidos, Parintius, Itacoatiara, Manáos,

Carvoeiro, Moreira, Santa Izabel do Rio Negro, Carmo do Rio Branco,

Caracarahy, Boca do Canumã, Baetas, Boca do Rio Machado, Boca do Purús,

Campina, Nova Olinda, Canutama, Cachoeira de Hyutanahan, Boca do Pauhiny,

Boca do Acre, Rio Branco, Seuna Madureira, Coary, Teffé, Boca do Juruá,

Juruapeca, Mearary, Boca do Tarauacá, Cruzeiro do Sul, Boca do Jutahy, S.

Paulo de Olivença, Benjamin Constant and Santo Antonio de Maripi.

Art. 65. There shall be floating deposits, so that they can be moved from

one place to another, as the growth of navigation in this or that place

may require; they shall have sufficient capacity for the movement of

steamers at the station they are serving and passes modern apparatus for

discharging the coal, which will reduce to a minimum the raising of dust,

and load the steamers as quickly as possible.

Art. 66. At points where it may be thought necessary, the deposits shall

be provided with tanks for fuel oil, which can be placed on the platform

with coal, or on separate floating platforms.

Art. 67. The establishment of the deposits and the business of furnishing

fuel to the steamers, shall be by contract after a public bidding and

signed by the Minister of Agriculture.

Art. 68. The floating material for the depositories and the fuel imported

shall be free of all import duties, including the fees.

The fees in the custom houses shall be ordered through a requisition from

the Minister of Agriculture, from whom the contracting party shall ask

it, for each shipment, with the necessary data.

Art. 69. The fuel imported by the corporation can only be sold for river

navigation service.

Art. 70. The maximum prices at which the party can sell fuel to steamers,

shall be according to tables approved annually by the Minister. These

may be altered during the year, when so necessary in the opinion of the

Government.

Art. 71. The contracting party shall not be subject to payment of any

state or municipal duties, because the object is the public federal

service.

Art. 72. In places where the party has and the Government has not

deposits of fuel, to him shall be given the preference for furnishing

the quantity necessary for the national vessels of war, at the prices

received when supplying the vessels of individuals.

Art. 73. In extraordinary circumstances and at the requisition of the

Government, the contracting party shall place at its disposition all the

deposits of fuel on hand, being afterwards indemnified for a part or all

of the fuel delivered, and afterwards another payment of the value of the

deposits unused, corresponding to the profits lost during the time of

the interruption of his business, calculated on an equal period of the

preceding year.

Art. 74. The bidding for the contract shall be upon the terms for the

installation of the depositories, their reversion to the Union and the

selling price of fuel for the first year.

TITLE V

The creation of centres producing foodstuffs in the valley of the Amazon

CHAPTER I

The leasing of the national plantations of Rio Branco

Art. 75. The Minister of Agriculture can contract for the leasing of the

two national plantations S. Bento and S. Marcos, except the part situated

between the Rivers Mahú, Takutú, Surumú and Cotingo, by public bidding,

or independent of it, with a corporation or party sufficiently able,

observing the following dispositions which shall be explained and assured

in the clauses of the detailed contracts.

1. The party will be obliged to:

(a) Develop and practice on a large scale, by the best and most modern

methods the breeding of cattle of different kinds and the cultivation of

the usual alimentary cereals;

(b) Establish a packing house for the preparation of dried beef and a

factory for the canning of alimental animal and vegetable products.

(c) Equip a factory for milk products, in which in addition to making

cheese and butter, milk shall be prepared by the Pasteur system or some

other that may be better, in condition to be supplied to the seringaes

and estates of the interior.

(d) Equip a central mill for the treatment of rice and other cereals

and two improved factories for mandioca flour, as soon as the number of

colonies localized can produce a sufficient supply of raw material for

such establishment.

(e) Receive and localize the immigrants who may desire to settle on the

lands of the plantation, in accordance with the dispositions of this

regulation and with the decrees number 9,081, Nov. 3, 1911, referring to

the peopling of the soil, and number 9,214, Dec. 15, 1911, referring to

the protection of the Indians and localization of native laborers, in the

parts that may be proper.

(f) Present to the Minister for approval the plans and descriptive

memorandum, with as much detail as possible, of the agricultural nucleus

which he shall be obliged to establish and all the installations

referring to the factories and services necessary for the complete

equipment of the plantations, within the maximum space of 2 years, to

count from the signing of the contract.

(g) Be subject to inspection by the Government for the faithful execution

of the contract, on the terms therein established.

Art. 76. To the party or corporation the following favors will be granted:

(a) Exemption from all import duties, including fees, in the form and

by the process referred to in article 91, for all the imported material

necessary to complete the equipment of the plantations, including houses,

barns, pastures, fences, reservoirs, implements and machines for the

culture, harvesting and treating the cereals, installation of mills and

factories, improved cattle, seeds of alimentary and industrial plants,

as well as for the materials and chemicals necessary to maintain the

factories and husbandry, during the time of his contract.

(b) Right of condemnation for public use, of the property or improvements

of individuals, which may be necessary, in the opinion of the Government

for any of the services of the enterprise.

(c) All the favors specified in articles 131 and 132 of decree number

9,081, Nov. 3, 1911, native and foreign colonies being made equal.

(d) Preference for the contract of the works necessary for the

improvement of the navigation of the Rio Branco, if the price is

considered acceptable by the Government and the time for the completion

of the work not more than 6 years.

Art. 77. The term of the lease in the contract shall be 60 years, at the

end of which all the cattle for breeding and all the improvements then

possessed by the lessee shall revert to the dominion of the Union.

Art. 78. Within the term of 1 year, to date from the signing of the

contract, the Government will give to lessee a copy of the plans of

the plantations, in which shall be marked the water courses with a

specification of those navigable, the zone of forest and plain and the

situations of the occupants who may be found.

Art. 79. The plantations shall be turned over as soon as an inventory

of the improvements, and the number of cattle of each kind then on the

plantation can be made.