Stevenson Plan

The Stevenson Restriction Scheme was a government price setting by the British government for natural rubber from 1922 to the Great Depression.

Background

In the early 1900s resulted in an increase in the use of rubber in automobile tires and waterproof products such as boots to an increased demand for natural rubber. This is mainly resin of the rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis ), whose growth is restricted to tropical climates. 1920 75 % of the natural rubber production was controlled by multinational companies with business in the United Kingdom. The importers of natural rubber, the Russian Empire, the German Empire and the United States, there was Anstrengungnen to develop methods for the production of synthetic rubber.

In 1910 United States Rubber Company cultivated plantations for natural rubber in Sumatra. From 1914 to 1922, the price of natural rubber oscillated between 0.115 and $ 1.02 per USD / pound. Mildew on rubber trees in Brazil reduced the local productivity. The resulting price increase prompted the natural rubber producers to create new plantations in British Malaya and the Dutch East Indies.

After the October Revolution Multinational companies were expropriated without compensation in Soviet Russia, after an embargo was imposed and the Moscow plant " Krasny Bogatyr " synthetic rubber from alcohol and Treugolnik ( Triangle, nationalized Russian - American India Rubber Co. ) was prepared in Leningrad from petroleum.

Rubber Investigation Committee

Approximately 1920 asked the British Rubber Growers Association to Secretary of State for the Colonies, Winston Churchill, for help. Churchill suggested a committee of inquiry, the Rubber Investigation Committee, which was instrumental occupied by representatives of the British Rubber Growers Association, and the James Stevenson, 1st Baron Stevenson, chaired, on to stabilize the world market price for natural rubber. The Rubber Investigation Committee developed the Stevenson Restriction Scheme, which should be stable distinguished by a quarterly determination of the export price by the Secretary of State for the Colonies the price. The governments of Ceylon and the Federated Malay States sanctioned the price limit. In October 1922 the Legislative Council of the Federated Malay States, the export of Rubber (Restriction ) Enactment was adopted in Federal and stepped through publication on 1 November 1922 in force.

Threat to the U.S. lifestyle

In the period of price fixing, there was a doubling of global demand for natural rubber. In the United States about 75% of global natural rubber production was consumed. 1925 saw Herbert Hoover in the UK default price a threat to the American way of life. The Government of the Netherlands was offered by the British government to participate in price determination. They did not. In Liberia in 1923 ran from the concession of the Netherlands for the cultivation of natural rubber and then the Firestone Natural Rubber Company from 1926 leased sweeping landscapes for 99 years. Through the freedom of workers who practiced on these rubber plantations capitalism of slavery in relation is superior to profit.

Export of natural rubber

Import of natural rubber