Editorial Note
During the period May 5–9, 1952, the Ninth Meeting of the International Rubber Study Group, which consisted of the major rubber-producing and -consuming nations, convened in Ottawa. Due to a recent decline in the price of natural rubber as a result of falling demand since 1951, the producing nations, led by Indonesia, were able to establish a Working Party within the Study Group structure for the purpose of considering “whether measures designed to prevent burdensome surpluses or serious shortages of rubber are necessary and practicable.” The reports of the United States Delegate to the Ottawa meeting, Willis C. Armstrong, Acting Deputy Director of the Office of International Materials Policy, are in file 398.2395/6–2352.
The Working Party convened for its first session from July 30 to August 15 in London where it gave preliminary consideration to a possible multilateral rubber agreement proposed by Indonesia and a buffer stock agreement proposed by the representatives of the British colonial territories. Armstrong’s report on this meeting is in file 398.2395/9–1652.
The Working Party reconvened in London for its second session from January 5 to 27, 1953. For a summary report of that meeting, which focused more specifically on the proposal for the purchase by the United States and the United Kingdom of a buffer stock of rubber to reduce the supply and raise the price, see the paper by Armstrong, dated February 10, 1953, page 932.