Evening star., 1943-11-14
Costly Amazon Rubber Project
Is Falling Far Short of Goal
By Marquis ". Childs.

" u VIbuSs
volume were to come out of the Amazon,
then these expenditures would be justi-
fed otherwise they may seem little
fantastic.
Crop of Rum0rs.
incidentally the Amazon has not failed
on one crop and that is the rumor crop.
The valley is a great sounding box for
the widest stories. The group of news
papermen touring the region ON planes
provided by the Rubber Development
Corp. heard at half dozen points that
a Senate committee would shortly arrive
to look into the whole operation. Archi-
bald Johnston, the salty, tough-talking
Scotsman who directs Henry Ford's rub
ber plantation at Belterra, told us that
the Truman committee had material in
its files to show that the rubber coming
out of the Amazon would cost the Gov
eminent $500 pound. CThe world price
in the years just before the war averaged
about 20 cents pound)
The waste seems to have grown
chiefly out of split over policy that
occurred in the course of Rubber De-
velopment's operations. It is another
instance of the split personality-bet-
tween New Deal objectives and ambi-
tlons and the hard-boiled demands of
ruthless confiict-that has marked the
Roosevelt administration of the war.
And something of the same split apears
to have occurred within the Vasgas
regime here in Brazil
Early last spring when the Board of
Economic Warfare was given authority
over the rubber import program, new
policy was projected. The idea was to
cut through the old system of Amazon
rubber production and get real volume
by direct operation. Supplies were to
be sent direct to the seringueiras, or rub
Der tappers. ignoring the merchants and
seringalists, or suppliers, who, in the
past, have eXerted firm control over
the natives in the bush, keeping them
constantly in debt and therefore more or
less enslaved. 1t was an ancient system.
going back to the Spanish padrons,
which Washington decided to cut across.
Supplies were ordered from Washing
ton on colossal scale-5O, 900 900 tin
cups, thousands of shotguns, thousands
of machetes, thousands of gross of ata-
brine tablets to combat malaria. Col
laboratorS of like mind were found in
Brazil, conspicuously Joao Alberto Lins
de Barros, Vargas Minister of Economic
ordination.
With the end of the big Amazon rub
Der boom in 1912-when the Far Eastern
plantations began to produce-rubber
tappers gradually moved out of the val
ley. 1t slowly became an empty wilder
ness. Joao Alberto undertook to move
in new labor supply from the drought
stricken State of Ceara in Northeast
Brazil. These Brazilian Okies were to
be moved on river steamers and housed
in model camps along the way until
they reached the rubber producing areas
where they were to be schooled in rub
Der tapping.
On paper this was stimulating and
provocative scheme with broad social i'm
pllcations Fifty thousand, perhaps even
10000, men were to be moved. In execu-
ton it failed sadly. BY April S only
1889 workers had actually been delivered
to Belem. The number increased later.
but thousands were kept in transient
camps, and paid, for months at a time.
The total number of workers moved
into the bush this year may not exceed
mn ind
During all this time Americans and
American millions were pouring into the
Amazon Valley. Grandiose plans were
projected. The number of administra-
tors, technicians and experts in Manaus
was so large that an American village
was designed to house them with an
American hotel, staff headquarters and
comforts and conveniences of living
rarely enjoyed in the Amazon. This
last never got beyond the stage of
handsome architects drawing in pastel
colors. A combination personnel di-
rector and social hostess came from
Washington to look after the welfare
and the morals of secretaries and
stenographers.
Lived in Opera House.
Office space in Manaus was at a pre-
MUM with Rubber Development officials
scattered through half dozen buildings.
Executives occupied even the stars
dressing rooms in Manaus' famous opera
house which was built at the cost of
million dollars during the height of the
1910 rubber boom. Natives complained
bitterly that house rents were soaring
servants were impossible to obtain and
prices generally rising as result of the
food Of American money. BY Brazilian
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