832.6176/37: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Brazil (Morgan)
72. Rubber manufacturers in the United States are actively interested in establishing and financing collectively some organization to stimulate the production of wild rubber in the Amazon Valley, providing [Page 576] capital, guaranteeing future prices, establishing new and broader purchasing and collecting agencies, and other effective methods so that full potential production will reach world markets.30
Please make appropriate inquiries of the Brazilian Government as follows:
- (1)
- Would such action by American companies in Brazil or in connection with residents of Brazil be welcomed?
- (2)
- Would the Government give assurances that export duties on rubber would not be advanced?
- (3)
- Would Brazil give assurances that it would not restrict the free production and exportation of rubber?
Please expedite and reply by cable. Also, state which of the above methods is believed to be most effective. Give your opinion on soundness.
Manufacturers believe that with proper encouragement a 60-thousand-ton crop could be produced for the year ending June 1927. Such an organization would ultimately be expected to extend its rubber plantation interests on large scale into new regions.
- In this connection, see sections entitled “Efforts by the United States to obtain for American rubber manufacturers relief from British restrictions on the export of raw rubber,” Foreign Relations, 1925, vol. ii, p. 245, and ibid., 1926, vol. ii, p. 358.↩