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- Title
The Domestication of the Rubber Tree: Economic and Sociological Implications.
- Authors
Schultes, Richard Evans
- Abstract
This article discusses the global importance of the Amazonian rubber tree Hevea brasilensis. The Amazonian tappers are obliged to live, often far from their homes, in rudimentary shacks during the three or four month tapping season. These temporary abodes, built on floodable land, are usually devoid of gardens or fruit trees, and the tappers, especially those who smoked latex into large balls, leaves little time for hunting or fishing. The result often was malnutrition, especially if the tapper lived with the family during this period. Frequently, the shack is located in malarial areas. The advantage to humanity of domestication of food plants are usually at once understood and accepted by the public in general. This is not always so with plants such as the rubber tree which must be managed in great plantations by large corporations financially able to sustain maintenance and development. Criticism of this type of management of the extensive rubber plantations is frequently heard. The efforts of the British looking for new crops for their tropical colonies, particularly rubber, in the Victorian period is very often criticized as blatant imperialism, and the early scientists and others who took part in the domestication of Hevea brasiliensis have sometimes been described as tools of commercial imperialism.
- Subjects
HEVEA; RUBBER plants; DOMESTICATION of plants; IMPERIALISM; TREE tapping; PLANT nutrition
- Publication
American Journal of Economics & Sociology, 1993, Vol 52, Issue 4, p479
- ISSN
0002-9246
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1536-7150.1993.tb02573.x