GERMANY AND THE PRODUCTION OF RUBBER. [To TM EDITOR or
THE " Snorwroa."] Sue —In your article " Germany's Economic Weakness," pub- lished last week, you say that in German East Africa "she hal begun to build up an appreciable rubber-producing industry." Quite true! That industry should have produced for the European market just over twenty million pounds of rubber• annually prior to the outbreak of war. But the industry never was and never can be a financial success for the simple reason that Germany never could understand that the secret of producing raw material in the tropics lies not in "white machinery," but with the native producer. There is tragedy behind this significant fact, which European statesmen must not overlook in settling the future of tropical and semi-tropical regions.—I am, Sir, &c., JOHN H. HARRIS.
Worcester Lodge, 191 East Dulwich Grove, S.E. 22.
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