BOIS ET FORÊTS DES TROPIQUES, 2016, N° 328 (2)
H ISTO IR E D U C AO U TC H O U C D E MA DA G A S C A R / L E P OI NT S U R …
27
The short and forgotten history of rubber
in Madagascar: the first controversy between
biodiversity conservation
and natural resource exploitation
Pascal Danthu1, 2, 3
Herintsitohaina Razakamanarivo3, 4, 5
Bernadette Deville-Danthu2
Lala Razafy Fara4
Yannick Le Roux6
Éric Penot3, 7
Cirad
Avenue Agropolis
34398 Montpellier Cedex 5
France
1
Cirad
Direction régionale
BP 853, Antananarivo
Madagascar
2
Cirad
DP Forêts et Biodiversité
BP 853, Antananarivo
Madagascar
3
École Supérieure des Sciences
Agronomiques
Département des Eaux et Forêts
BP 3044
Antananarivo
Madagascar
4
Laboratoire des Radio-isotopes
Route d’Andraisoro
BP 3383
Antananarivo
Madagascar
5
Projet Forma
SCAC
Ambassade de France à Madagascar
present address:
Ministère des Affaires Etrangères
29 rue de la Convention
75732 Paris Cedex 15
France
6
Cirad
UMR Innovations
34398 Montpelier Cedex 5
France
7
Illustration 1.
A remarkable specimen of Euphorbia intisy and collector near Fort-Dauphin (not dated)
(Doc. XI. Ba n° 48, Fonds Grandidier, Parc botanique et zoologique de Tsimbazaza,
Antananarivo, copyright PBZT).
28
P. DANTHU, H. RAZAKAMANARIVO, B. DEVILLEDANTHU, L. RAZAFY FARA, Y. LE ROUX, E. PENOT
BOIS ET FORÊTS DES TROPIQUES, 2016, N° 328 (2)
F O CU S / H ISTO RY O F RUB B ER IN MA DA GA S C A R
RÉSUMÉ
ABSTRACT
RESUMEN
LA COURTE HISTOIRE OUBLIÉE DU
CAOUTCHOUC À MADAGASCAR :
LA PREMIÈRE CONTROVERSE ENTRE
CONSERVATION DE LA BIODIVERSITÉ
ET EXPLOITATION DES RESSOURCES
NATURELLES
THE SHORT AND FORGOTTEN HISTORY
OF RUBBER IN MADAGASCAR: THE FIRST
CONTROVERSY BETWEEN BIODIVERSITY
CONSERVATION AND NATURAL RESOURCE
EXPLOITATION
LA BREVE Y OLVIDADA HISTORIA DEL
CAUCHO EN MADAGASCAR: PRIMERA
CONTROVERSIA ENTRE CONSERVACIÓN
DE LA BIODIVERSIDAD Y EXPLOTACIÓN DE
RECURSOS NATURALES
Madagascar fut entre 1891 et 1914 une
zone de production de caoutchouc sylvestre
destiné à l’exportation vers l’Europe. Le
poids de Madagascar dans le commerce
mondial resta toujours modeste, mais cette
activité eut des conséquences écologiques
importantes. De nombreuses espèces endémiques furent exploitées, dans une optique
de productivité immédiate et maximale
sans prise en compte de notion de gestion
durable. Cet épisode représentant l’un des
premiers cas d’exploitation des ressources
biologiques malgaches à des fins industrielles a été l’un des éléments déclencheurs
de la prise de conscience de la valeur de
la biodiversité malgache et des menaces
induites par des activités humaines mal
contrôlées. Il aboutit à la promulgation
d’une législation très répressive et coercitive à l’endroit des populations locales désignées comme principales responsables.
Mais les naturalistes jugèrent les décisions
politiques inefficaces. Ils développèrent
alors un discours volontairement alarmiste
et catastrophiste ayant pour but de faire
réagir les politiques jugés trop laxistes. Discours d’ailleurs pris à contre-pied lorsque
l’effort de guerre relança la filière caoutchouc malgache entre 1942 et 1945. Cet
épisode fut un élément déclencheur de la
création, dès 1927, d’un réseau d’aires protégées, faisant de Madagascar un pionnier
en Afrique. Parallèlement la domestication
des espèces caoutchoutières malgaches et/
ou l’introduction des espèces à fort potentiel furent promues. Cependant, l’émergence du caoutchouc issu de l’hévéaculture
asiatique fit rapidement retomber l’intérêt
commercial du caoutchouc malgache, épargnant ainsi les forêts de la Grande Île. Ainsi,
c’est le réalisme économique qui condamna
la filière devenue non rentable et assura la
sauvegarde des espèces à caoutchouc malgaches plutôt que les discours des naturalistes, la création d’aires protégées ou la
promulgation de textes répressifs.
From 1891 to 1914, Madagascar was producing forest rubber for export to Europe.
Although Madagascar’s contribution to the
world rubber market was very modest, this
episode had major consequences for the
island’s ecology. Many endemic species
were exploited, with a view to maximising
short-term productivity with no consideration for sustainability. This was one of the
first cases of biological resource exploitation in Madagascar for industrial purposes,
and was one of the factors that triggered
awareness of the value of Madagascar’s biodiversity and the threats to which it might
be exposed because of badly managed
human activities. Highly repressive legislation was introduced and imposed on the
local populations, who were considered
mostly to blame for these threats. However, naturalists considered these policies
to be ineffective and responded in deliberately alarmist terms designed to provoke
a reaction from allegedly over-lenient policy-makers. Their position was caught on
the wrong foot in 1942-45, when the war
effort revitalised Malagasy rubber production. Nevertheless, the episode was one of
the factors behind the creation, in 1927, of
a network of protected areas managed by
naturalists, making Madagascar a conservation pioneer in Africa. Meanwhile, efforts
were made to promote the domestication
and/or introduction of high-potential rubber species. With the emergence of Asian
rubber production, however, all attempts
at rubber cultivation in Madagascar were
abandoned, thus sparing Madagascar’s
forests from further destruction. This episode shows how Malagasy rubber species
survived not thanks to naturalist discourse,
the creation of protected areas or the
enforcement of repressive legislation, but
because an unprofitable sector was abandoned for reasons of economic realism.
Entre 1891 y 1914 Madagascar fue una zona
productora de caucho silvestre destinado
al mercado europeo. A pesar del modesto
peso que siempre ocupó Madagascar en
el comercio mundial, dicha actividad tuvo
importantes consecuencias ecológicas. Se
explotaron muchas especies endémicas
buscando una productividad máxima e
inmediata sin integrar la noción de manejo
sostenible. Este episodio supone uno de
los primeros casos de explotación de los
recursos biológicos malgaches con fines
industriales y fue uno de los desencadenantes de la toma de conciencia del valor
de la biodiversidad de Madagascar y de
las amenazas generadas por actividades
humanas mal controladas. Esto llevó a la
promulgación de una legislación muy represiva y coercitiva destinada a la población
local, considerada como principal responsable. Sin embargo, los naturalistas juzgaron las decisiones políticas ineficaces e
intencionadamente adoptaron un discurso
alarmista y catastrofista para provocar la
reacción de unos representantes políticos
considerados demasiado permisivos. Dicho
discurso tomó un giro inesperado cuando
se reactivó el sector del caucho para contribuir al esfuerzo bélico entre 1942 y 1945.
La explotación del caucho fue uno de los
desencadenantes, en 1927, de la creación de una red de áreas protegidas que
convirtieron a Madagascar en una pionera
en África. Al mismo tiempo, se potenció la
domesticación de especies de caucho malgaches y/o la introducción de especies con
alto potencial. Sin embargo, la aparición
del caucho procedente de cultivos asiáticos
hizo decaer rápidamente el interés comercial del caucho malgache, protegiendo así
los bosques de la isla. Así pues, fue el realismo económico y no los discursos de naturalistas ni la creación de áreas protegidas o
la promulgación de leyes represivas quien
condenó un sector que no era rentable y
garantizó la protección de las especies de
caucho de Madagascar.
Mots-clés : histoire environnementale,
exploitation des ressources naturelles,
produit forestier non ligneux, caoutchouc
naturel, discours des naturalistes , effort de
guerre, Madagascar.
Keywords: environmental history, natural
resource exploitation, non-timber forest
products, natural rubber, naturalist discourse, war effort, Madagascar.
Palabras clave: historia ambiental, explotación de recursos naturales, productos forestales no madereros, caucho natural, discursos de las naturalistas, esfuerzo bélico,
Madagascar.
BOIS ET FORÊTS DES TROPIQUES, 2016, N° 328 (2)
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Introduction
hevea seeds had been introduced through estates in North
Sumatra and by Chinese traders into the South in the first
decade of the 20th century. In Borneo, the first seedlings had
been introduced in 1882 (Dove, 1995). Seeds were distributed to the ‘natives’ in 1908 by the Sarawak Government.
In Kalimantan, Chinese merchants, Catholic missionaries
and a Dutch private company (“Nanga Jettah”) introduced
rubber seeds in 1909 (King, 1988).
The first recorded production from Asian plantations
(Chevalier and Le Bras, 1949), in 1900, was modest (four
tonnes) but from that point on it increased rapidly. Figure
1 shows that from 1915, forest rubber was swept aside by
productions from the Asian hevea plantations and jungle
rubber (agroforestry system where rubber is allowed to grow
with secondary forest [Penot, 2001]). By 1930, they were
supplying more than 95% of the world’s requirements.
A regular, low cost supply, with long term stability, of
a product conforming to optimal technological qualities,
rapidly got the better of a production varying in quality and
quantity, the scarcity of which was being predicted by botanists (Bourdariat, 1911; Serier, 1993).
The short-lived history of African forest rubber has
been long forgotten. And yet, it still serves as a valuable
example of an economic sector which was established and
then abandoned as a direct result of overexploitation of a
natural resource. This history also marks the emergence of
an environmentalist and conservationist discourse, which is
still current. These are the elements that this article aims to
elucidate, focusing particularly on the case of Madagascar.
Between 1891 and 1914, forest rubber was collected
and exported from Madagascar. It occupied a minor place
on the world market, even though rubber was one of the
island’s principal export products. As noted by the Governor
Years
America (wild rubber)
Asia (wild rubber)
Africa (wild rubber)
Asia (plantation rubber)
Figure 1.
Relative importance of the various continents in
the production of natural rubber from 1895 to 1950
(from Delmas and Duffart, 1908a, 1908b; Fayol, 1909;
IRSG, 1996).
1950
1945
1940
1935
1930
1925
1920
1915
1910
1905
1900
1895
1890
1875
Proportion of rubber world production (%)
Up until 1900, the world’s natural rubber was produced
entirely through collections from wild plants. The commercial product was thus generically known as forest rubber (as
opposed to plantation rubber). Following the discovery by
Charles Goodyear, at the turn of the 19th century, that the process of vulcanisation (mixing with sulphur prior to heating)
allowed rubber to retain its elasticity and resistance, industrial
development, more specifically that of tyre manufacturing,
created a strong and constantly expanding demand (Bouvier,
1947; Serier, 1993; IRSG, 1996; Mooibroek and Cornish, 2000).
At that time, the market in forest rubber, obtained from
a diverse range of species, including lianas, shrubs and
trees, was supplied by three continents: America, Asia and
Africa (figure 1), where the production zones were limited to
tropical regions. Ficus elastica was exploited in the British
and Dutch possessions of Southeast Asia (India, Burma,
Java, Borneo, Malaysia), essentially prior to 1870 (Jumelle,
1903; Lavauden, 1941; Serier, 1993). At the end of the 19th
century, Amazonia, and in particular the regions of Para
and Manaus, became the principal regions for the production and exportation of rubber from the hevea tree (Hevea
brasiliensis). But, after having represented more than half
of the world’s production, making towns like Manaus fleetingly rich, Amazonian production plummeted discernibly
after 1910 as Asian rubber production took off (Coïc, 2000)
(figure 1). Other species, in other regions, were also solicited, such as Manihot glaziovii, or Castilloa elastica, originally from Mexico, and for some time, were considered to
produce the best rubber (Weinstein, 1983; Homma, 1992;
Serier, 1993; Coïc, 2000).
The production of rubber collected from the African
continent was transient, beginning around 1880 (Delmas
and Duffart, 1908b; Chevalier, 1926) and lasting until
around 1910. At its peak in 1900, it represented
around a third of the world’s production (figure
100
1). Numerous forest and savanna species supplied the African production, amongst which
the main ones were Futumia elastica, Clitandra
cymosa and Landolphia heudelotii (Chevalier,
75
1921, 1926; Serier, 1993).
However, from the middle of the 19th century, it became apparent that the production
50
of forest rubber would be inadequate to provide for the growing requirements of European
and American industrialists, in particular with
the development of the car and tyre industries
25
after the First World War. Hence, the idea was
conceived to domesticate and cultivate the
main rubber species. After numerous attempts,
0
frequently recounted (Bouvier, 1947; Chevalier
and Le Bras, 1949; Serier, 1993), the first hevea
rubber trees were established in 1876 in Ceylon.
Henceforth, cultivation spread to the whole of the
British and Dutch possessions in Southeast Asia
at the turn of the century. Rubber was introduced
in Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand. In Sumatra,
29
30
BOIS ET FORÊTS DES TROPIQUES, 2016, N° 328 (2)
F O CUS / HISTO RY O F RUB B ER IN M A DA GA SC A R
General Galliéni (1908), “rubber of which we find excellent
species in the forests of coastal and intermediate regions,
is one of Madagascar’s best sources of wealth, especially
since it has become a prime industrial component in the
manufacture of bicycles, cars and surgical instruments”.
Its extraction had major consequences at a biological level
but also contributed to an increasing awareness amongst
naturalists of the degradations that the Malagasy forests,
remarkable for their biodiversity and endemicity, were suffering (Baron, 1890; Perrier de la Bâthie, 1921). This study
describes, therefore, in detail the processes which, (i)
allowed Madagascar to participate for the first time in the
world economy, (ii) engendered what was presented as an
ecological catastrophe and, (iii) uphold the conservationist
discourse. And as such it describes the emergence of the
controversy between the exploitation and valorization of the
island’s biological resources and the conservation of its biodiversity, a controversy which is still active to this day (Gade,
1996; Myers et al., 2000; Pollini, 2011; Scales, 2012).
Figure 2.
Distribution of the three major Malagasy vegetation zones
and the ports for the exportation of Malagasy rubber
between 1891 and 1920; the names were those current
during the colonial period and the most important ports are
underlined (from the Bulletin économique de Madagascar,
1900 to 1911; Humbert, 1955; Bégué, 1966; Gautier and
Goodman, 2003).
Main features of the Malagasy
rubber sector
The objective in this first part will be to describe the place
occupied by the rubber sector in a local and international
context both from an economic and a biological perspective.
A modest sector on a global scale but of local importance
The use of rubber in Madagascar was reported as
early as 1791 by the explorer Abbé Rochon in his “Voyage
à Madagascar et aux Indes orientales”, where he made reference to “the milky fluid that the islanders extract from the
trees they call finguiere, which gives when coagulated the
remarkable substance known to naturalists as gum elastic. The elastic properties of this resinous gum have more
recently been put to good use in the arts. In surgery it has
already been used to great advantage in perfecting such
things as bandages and catheters.” Rear admiral Dumont
d’Urville described in his “Voyage autour du monde” (he put
into port at Tamatave in 1830) “voaene, a sarmentose shrub
which affords gum elastic”. The first exportation of Malagasy
rubber to Europe, however, appears to have occurred in
1870 (Decary, 1962). Production increased, after 1882, with
the exploitation of Landolphia, a liana from the east coast,
which was exported to Germany and Great Britain. But,
it was not until 1891 onwards, when the quality of rubber
sourced from Euphorbia intisy (illustration 1, figure 2) in the
region of Fort-Dauphin was recognised, that the exploitation
of rubber became significant (Prudhomme, 1899/1900;
Zimmermann, 1899; Piolet, 1901; Decary, 1962; Tixier,
1982; Serier, 1993).
Figure 3 shows that this production peaked in 1906
and 1910, the only years for which records show a yield in
excess of a thousand tonnes. Despite this, Malagasy production represented no more than 5 to 6% of total African
output and less than 2% of world output.
The production of rubber in Madagascar was directly
dependant on the political events which marked the beginning of French rule. The exploitation of rubber was coetaneous with the wars and insurrections which preceded
and followed the voting of the act dated 6th August 1896
declaring Madagascar a French colony (Galliéni, 1908). The
production curve of Malagasy rubber is a stark reflection
of the ups and downs of the island’s military and political
circumstances. Thus, the insurrection which broke out in
the south of the island at the beginning of 1897 explains
the drop in harvest and exportation during this period
(Prudhomme, 1899/1900) (figure 3). This region was the
field for military operations again in 1900-1902, to which
fall in production recorded at this time can be partly attributed (Poisson, 1908; Brown, 2000). On the other hand, the
sharp fall in exports from Madagascar (as well as Africa) in
1908 resulted from the financial crisis that rocked America
in 1907-1908, which can be put down in part to the poor
sales of cars and over stocking of primary materials in previous years (Fayol, 1909; Fauchère, 1911).
Malagasy production diminished to almost zero from 1916.
BOIS ET FORÊTS DES TROPIQUES, 2016, N° 328 (2)
H ISTO IR E D U C AO U TC H O U C D E MA DA G A S C A R / L E P OI NT S U R …
Figure 4 compares the value of rubber exports
from Madagascar with the value of other principal exports during the period in which rubber production
was significant in Madagascar. Gold was the main export product. Its value increased steadily until 1909
before gradually diminishing. Before the war, leather
and raffia were major resources for Madagascar,
whilst vanilla played a marginal role. After the war,
these three products became the island’s principal
exports. The curve of exports linked to rubber was
highly erratic. These variations reflect the previously
mentioned political events. However, on four occasions (the years 1898, 1899, 1906 and 1910) rubber
was Madagascar’s number one export product.
1600
World (x 1000 t)
Africa (x 100 t)
Madagascar (t)
Yearly production
1200
800
1950
1945
1940
1935
1930
1925
1920
1915
1910
1905
1900
1895
1890
1885
1880
0
1875
400
Years
25
20
Exploitation implicating
all the Malagasy ecosystems
43,0
gold
vanilla
leather
raffia
rubber
15
10
5
Years
Figure 4.
Value of rubber exports from Madagascar (expressed in
millions of current francs), compared with the value of
Madagascar’s main export products between 1896 and 1920
(from Griess, 1907; Galliéni, 1908; Bulletin économique de
Madagascar, 1900 to 1927; Loisy, 1914).
1920
1918
1916
1914
1912
1910
1908
1906
1904
1902
1900
1898
0
1896
Exportation values (in millions of current francs)
Figure 3.
Evolution of the production of natural rubber in Madagascar
(in tonnes) between 1875 and 1950, compared with the
evolution of African production (in hundreds of tonnes),
and world production (in thousands of tonnes) (from Griess,
1907; Delmas and Duffart, 1908a, 1908b; Galliéni, 1908;
Fayol, 1909; Loisy, 1914; Canaby, 1932; Lavauden, 1941;
Chevalier and Le Bras, 1949; Tixier, 1982; IRSG, 1996).
Malagasy rubber was essentially destined for
the European market. Germany and Britain were the
two main importers prior to French colonisation, after
which production was shipped to the French ports
(Le Havre, Bordeaux, Marseille), as well as Liverpool,
Hamburg and Antwerp (Besson, 1908; Durand, 1908;
Claude, 1909; Canaby, 1932).
Numerous Malagasy ports served as exit points
for rubber. Tonnages exported varied considerably
from year to year, but as a general rule, the main
points of export were Tamatave on the east coast,
Majunga and Hell-Ville (Nosy Be) on the west coast,
Fort-Dauphin and Tuléar in the south (figure 2).
At the outset of the 20th century, the forest
zones of Madagascar covered between a fifth and
a third of the island’s surface (Perrier de la Bâthie,
1936; Coudreau, 1937; McConnell, 2002). The presence of lianescent, arborescent and shrubby rubber producing species was charted in all the forest
ecosystems: the evergreen humid forest in the east
and north (Prudhomme, 1899/1900; Thiry, 1903;
Vergely, 1907; Jumelle and Perrier de la Bâthie, 1909,
1910, 1912), the dry deciduous forests in the west
(Jumelle, 1901; Louvel, 1910; Jumelle and Perrier de
la Bâthie, 1911; Perrier de la Bâthie, 1912) and the
xerophilous scrubland in the south (Chapotte, 1898;
Vacher, 1907; Poisson, 1908) (figure 2).
Figure 5 takes into consideration the respective proportions of these three major vegetation
zones in the production of Malagasy rubber. It shows
that between 1897 and 1910, production was divided relatively equally between the three ecological
regions. The forest in the east had a share which,
depending on the year, varied from 22 to 52%, that
of the western forest from 25 to 31%, whilst the southern bush had a share of between 17 and 34%.
The entire species of Malagasy rubber
belong exclusively to three botanical families:
Asclepiadaceae, Apocynaceae and Euphorbiaceae.
Table I shows that the Apocynaceae belong, for the
31
BOIS ET FORÊTS DES TROPIQUES, 2016, N° 328 (2)
F O CUS / HISTO RY O F RUB B ER IN M A DA GA SC A R
most part, to the Landolphia genus (voahena, or fingotry, as
it is known in Malagasy, the species most certainly described by Abbé Rochon [1791] and Dumont d’Urville [1848]),
Mascarenhasia (guidroa, barabanja and hazondrano), and
Plectaneia, and are present in the evergreen forest in the east
and deciduous in the west. The Asclepiadaceae are represented by species belonging to five genus, Cryptostegia (lombiro), Gonocrypta, Pentopetia, Marsdenia and Secamonopsis,
which are present in the west and south. The Euphorbiaceae
are represented by two arborescent species: Euphorbia pirahazo in the west and E. intisy (herotsy) (illustration 1) in the
southern bush (Baron, 1890; Girod-Genet, 1898; Lecomte,
1899; Zimmermann, 1899; Jumelle, 1901; Drake del Castillo,
1902; Thiry, 1903; Canaby, 1932; Boiteau, 1943; Comité du
Caoutchouc, 1943; Decary, 1962, 1966).
The majority of rubber species are endemic to
Madagascar, with the exception of Cryptostegia grandiflora,
which is also present in other islands in the Indian Ocean
(Jumelle, 1912), and Mascarenhasia arborescens, also distributed in East Africa (Schatz, 2001). Often, even the genera
are endemic, as is the case for Gonocrypta, Pentopetia,
Secamonopsis and Plectaneia (Boiteau, 1943; Mabberley,
1987; MBG, 2010). On the other hand, the Landolphia
species is very widely represented amongst the rubber species exploited in dry and tropical Africa, as far as Senegal
(Delmas and Duffard, 1908b; Fayol, 1909; Etesse, 1913;
Chevalier, 1926; Chevalier and Le Bras, 1949).
The quality of rubber produced was highly species
dependant. Hence the majority of Mascarenhasia produced
good quality rubber with a high latex content (40-45%) and
low resin content (5-6%). They were marketed under the name
of “Madagascar Niggers”. “Palay Rubber” was extracted from
the Cryptostegia species. The brands known as “Majunga
Rose” and “Madagascar Pinky” were associated, on the
whole, with rubber from the best species of Landolphia from
the west of the island, and for which the value on the European
market was close to that of Para (derived from Brazilian hevea
rubber), which was (and remains) the gold standard at the
time (Bourdariat, 1911; Boiteau, 1943; Fournier et al, 1990).
Gonocrypta grevei (kompitso in Malagasy) also produced a
good quality rubber. However, the best Malagasy rubber was
obtained from Euphorbia intisy (illustration 1), which had a
very high latex content (44%) and extremely low resin content
(around 1%). The other species were of low value, producing rubber with a high resin content, which was often sticky
(Constantin and Galland, 1907; Boiteau, 1943).
“A fine example of lack of foresight
and a destructive economy”
(Decary, 1926)
The preparation of rubber required a series of simple
stages, nonetheless decisive in the quality of the finished
product and for the conservation of the biological resource:
extraction method, coagulation method, drying and storage of the rubber. These procedures were carried out by
Malagasy collectors in the forest. The rubber was then sold
in the villages or towns to locally based dealers, who were
Malagasy, Indian, Chinese or European.
In actual fact, the potential financial gain generated by
the sale of rubber was an incentive for many local peasants
to set themselves up as collectors. Whereas the lack of skill
and the concern for making quick, short-term financial gains
led to short cuts in the harvesting methods, endangering
the producing species, in the process. This exemplifies what
Decary (1926) defined as “A fine example of lack of foresight and
a destructive economy”.
Outdated modes of preparation
Relative weight of ecosystems in rubber production
32
100%
75%
50%
25%
0%
1897
1898
1899
1900
1907
1910
Years
Southern scrubland
Western forests
Eastern forests
Figure 5.
Share of each of the three vegetation zones (see figure
2) in the production of rubber, calculated on the basis of
exports declared by each exit port in the different zones of
Madagascar (from the Bulletin économique de Madagascar,
1900 to 1911).
In Brazil, seringueiros (tappers) initially locate the
trees scattered throughout the forest and create trails
connecting them. Then, two or three trails connecting 60
to 150 trees are established (a job which takes several
months). When the time comes to harvest the rubber,
they travel the length of each trail alternatively, early in
the morning, making an incision in the trunks (avoiding
damaging the vascular cambium). Then they travel the
trail again to harvest the latex which has collected in the
bowls under the incisions (Dean, 1983). This method
allows trees to remain productive for several years, thus
assuring their survival.
In Madagascar too, it was generally recommended
that trees be tapped, as this was the only procedure
considered compatible with sustainable conservation of
the resource (Louvel, 1910; Bourdariat, 1911). However,
it was certainly not always the case (table I).
Although tapping was also recommended by
some for the lianas (Girod-Genet, 1898), the most commonly used method consisted in dragging the lianas
to the ground, chopping them off at ground level and
cutting them into 50 to 60 cm logs. These were put on
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an improvised stand to bleed, the latex being collected in
a trough according to the diagram in illustration 2 (Thiry,
1903; Rey, 1905; Griess, 1907; Louvel, 1910; Fauchère,
1911; Bourdariat, 1911). Louvel (1910) explained the use
of this method as follows: “It’s not out of vandalism or a love
of destruction, that the natives have always […] cut the lianas into logs, as generally claimed, but because they had
practically no other means of harvesting.” This method was
potentially ecologically sustainable, because the species in
question puts out abundant suckers (Griess, 1907; Louvel,
1910). In spite of this, yields of rubber remained poor. This
led Perrier de la Bâthie and Jumelle (1907), and Louvel
(1910) to recommend chopping the liana fragments (by
crushing or pounding), a method which doubled, even quadrupled the yield in relation to bleeding the logs.
The object of coagulation was to concentrate the rubber particles in emulsion in the latex in order to create a
solid transportable mass (Chevalier and Le Bras, 1949). This
operation occurs naturally for some latex, such as E. intisy,
but for many others it was necessary to resort to the use of
Table I.
Taxonomy (updated by MBG, 2010), biological types, latex extraction method and rubber qualities (+: low; ++: medium; +++: high) of the main rubber
species exploited in Madagascar (according to Jumelle, 1901, 1903; Dubard, 1906; Constantin and Galland, 1907; Hamet and Josse, 1913; Perrier de
la Bâthie, 1910, 1912; Fauchère, 1911; Jumelle and Perrier de la Bâthie, 1908, 1909, 1911, 1912; Loisy, 1914; Boiteau, 1943; Léandri, 1952).
Family
Species
Plant type
Latex extraction method
Quality of rubber
Eastern evergreen forests
Apocynaceae
Landolphia gummifera (Poir.) K. Schum.
Landolphia mandrianambo Pierre
Landolphia myrtifolia (Poir.) Markgr.
Mascarenhasia arborescens A. DC.
Mascarenhasia lanceolata A. DC.
Large liana
Liana
Large liana
Tree/shrub
Small tree
Mascarenhasia macrosiphon Baker
Mascarenhasia rubra Jum. & H. Perrier
Tree
Tree
Draining logs from stems
Draining logs from stems
Draining logs from stems
Felling and cutting/stripping
Uprooting and stripping bark from
stems and roots
nd
Felling and tapping
+
nd
++
+++
++
+
+++
++
+++
+
nd
+++
Western deciduous forests
Apocynaceae
Asclepiadaceae
Euphorbiaceae
Landolphia mandrianambo Pierre
Landolphia myrtifolia (Poir.) Markgr.
Landolphia tenuis Jum.
Mascarenhasia arborescens A. DC.
Mascarenhasia lisianthiflora A. DC
Liana
Liana
Thin stemmed liana
Tree/shrub
Tree
Plectaneia elastica Jum. & H. Perrier
Plectaneia thouarsii Roem. & Schult.
Cryptostegia madagascariensis Bojer
ex Decne.
Gonocrypta grevei Baill.
Marsdenia verrucosa Decne.
Pentopetia elastica Jum. & H. Perrier
Pentopetia grevei (Baill.) Venter
Secamonopsis madagascariensis Jum.
Euphorbia pirahazo Jum.
Liana
Liana
Liana
Draining logs from stems
Draining logs from stems
Draining logs from stems
Felling and cutting/stripping
Uprooting and stripping bark from
stems and roots
Draining logs from stems
Draining logs from stems
Draining logs from stems
Liana/shrub
Liana
Liana
Liana/shrub
Liana/shrub
Large tree
Bark stripping
Tapping fruit
Draining logs from stems
nd
Tapping stems and fruit
Tapping, felling and cutting
++
+
+
+
++
++
nd
Bark stripping
nd
Tapping stems and fruit
Tapping, cutting trunk and roots
+
++
+
++
+++
+
+
++
Southern scrubland
Asclepiadaceae
Euphorbiaceae
nd: not determined.
Cryptostegia grandiflora (Roxb.) R. Br.
Gonocrypta grevei Baill.
Pentopetia grevei (Baill.) Venter
Secamonopsis madagascariensis Jum.
Euphorbia intisy Drake
Liana
Liana/shrub
Liana/shrub
Liana/shrub
Small tree
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chemical, mechanical or thermal processes. In Madagascar,
collectors used heating, or else the addition of dilute sulphuric acid, or concoctions of various fruits (lemons, tamarinds, and baobabs), sea salt or urine (Armand, 1901; Piolet,
1901; Rey, 1905; Bourdariat, 1911; Loisy, 1914; Comité du
Caoutchouc, 1943).
It should not be overlooked that the work of the collectors was extremely gruelling and performed by people
who often lived in extreme poverty, surviving on a very low
income. Lecomte (1899), a colonist from Farafangana, estimated that collectors of hazondrano (Mascarenhasia sp.)
“[…]were subjected to long treks in the forest, often travelling
for a month, to amass a man’s load of perhaps 25 to 30 kgs”.
Whilst Prudhomme (1899/1900) described the collector in
the following terms: “The Malagasy who goes off in search of
rubber […] does not burden himself with a mass of tools, he
simply equips himself with a specially formed machete which
he calls antsibé. If he is careful, he also takes along a cast
iron cauldron to prepare his meals and coagulate the latex,
Illustration 2.
Diagram of the device for collecting the extract of segments
of liana, as used by the collectors (Thiry, 1903).
Photo P. Danthu.
as well as a vial of sulphuric acid diluted with water or a stock
of sea salt, but in most cases, he considers this material too
burdensome […] assured that he is of finding all he needs in
the forest to perform his work, such as lemons and tamarinds
for the coagulation, a container to collect the latex”.
Another example of a method used in the south of the
island consisted in scooping out a cup in the ground at the
foot of the tree, which was then bled. The latex ran down the
trunk and was collected in the hollow, and then mixed with
sand and debris (Chapotte, 1898; Vacher, 1907).
Usually the rubber produced this way was formed into
balls the size of two fists and sold to the dealers (GirodGenet, 1898; Besson, 1908; Decary, 1962).
Exploitation gone awry
But these methods fairly rapidly fell by the wayside.
According to Lecomte (1899), the natives initially bled the
trees, but faced with the increase in demand, “exploitation
turned into a devastating fever”, in which the tree was felled,
the trunk surrounded with dead wood, which was ignited.
The effect of this was to coagulate the latex on the bark,
which was then hammered off, producing in the process
latex full of impurities (plant debris, sand, gravel…). In 1911,
Fauchère pointed out that the rubber hunters as a rule didn’t
fell the trees but inflicted wounds which often resulted in
their death. He also condemned the fact that “When lianas
were involved, […]. It was not uncommon to see the roots dug
up”. Girod-Genet (1898) spoke of “barbaric procedures”, a
concept which was echoed by numerous authors such as
Prudhomme (1899/1900), who talked about “irreparable
damage caused by the Negroes’ carelessness and the collectors’ greed”, and Hamet and Josse (1913) who decried “the
state of devastation” of the rubber groves.
The care (or moreover the lack of care) taken during
harvest depended partly on the collectors. Their motivations
varied, but, as a general rule, it can be said that rubber was
not a tradition for any Malagasy, which Vacher (1907) translated saying that “most of our natives […] were unaware of
the existence of rubber trees in their region”. However, certain ethnic groups were used to seeking out all or part of
their means of subsistence from the forest. Such was the
case, for instance, with the Tanala and the Sakalava who
turned their hand to rubber collecting quite naturally and
without changing their way of life (Tralboux, 1902; Vergely,
1907). But for others, collecting rubber became a subsidiary
activity, the main motivation of which was to earn income.
Thus, the Antaimoro became rapidly aware of the gains that
could be made from this new activity, so as to “improve their
savings, their well-being, their rice paddies and their herds”
(Vergely, 1907). Likewise, for the Antandroy, most of whom
were cattle breeders, the motivation to convert to rubber collecting was the creation of a tax on cattle in 1903, “anxious
to keep their enormous herds intact, they turned to rubber
for the cash they needed” (Vacher, 1907). Durand noted in
1908, moreover, that the “natives” very often only turned
to collecting rubber when the tax became due. Fremigacci
(1998) furthermore confirms that forest populations were
only able to pay the tax from the proceeds from the collection
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of forestry products: rubber but also raffia, wax and orsein.
This would appear to have been the primary motive of collectors in French continental Africa, too (Chevalier, 1921).
Farmers expected an income from rubber which would cover
the cost of the tax, but in French Equatorial Africa, collectors
were required from as early as 1904 to neglect their food
crops to devote themselves to collecting rubber resulting in
a decline in agriculture, and subsequent famine (Chevalier,
1921). There appear not to be any reports of this type of
situation in Madagascar. However, it has to be said that in
Madagascar, even if the rule remains largely fictional, user
rights were only authorised to cater for personal needs and
not for commercial purposes, resulting in what Fremigacci
(1998) referred to as “an economy of delinquency”.
This lack of tradition and the monetary incentive
explains why the exploitation methods used by the collectors were often careless, because the object was to ensure a
harvest and one with a high return (Thiry, 1903; Perrier de la
Bâthie, 1912; Boiteau, 1943).
The collectors were quick to come up with strategies to
increase the weight of rubber sold to dealers, whilst minimising the amount of time spent harvesting. This chapter in the
history deals with the frauds which were widely documented
by traders, administrators and scientists. The most common
fraud consisted in adulterating the balls of rubber by bulking up their weight with foreign objects such as stones, bark
and sand (Baron, 1890; Durand, 1908; Bourdariat, 1911).
Another trick was to soak them in water. An even more subtle
ruse cooked up by some collectors involved mixing the latex
of rubber species with that from widely available, poor quality
species (such as Ficus melleri, Plectaneia elastica, Plectaneia
thouarsii and Marsdenia verrucosa), increasing the collected
weight in the process, but reducing the quality of the end product (Griess, 1907; Jumelle and Perrier de la Bâthie, 1908;
Poisson, 1908; Louvel, 1910; Boiteau, 1943). It seems as
though this adulteration rapidly became standard practice,
and that a large proportion of the Malagasy rubber harvest
was subject to these types of fraudulent practice. However,
the same practices were observed in Brazil (Dean, 1983),
Asia (Penot, 2001) and in French West Africa, despite an initiative by the colonial powers to establish a “rubber training
programme” for collectors (Chevalier, 1921).
However, it is worth noting that the intermediaries in
the sector never placed a high value on quality in the rubber
delivered to them. Vacher (1907) pointed out that the best
prepared rubber was never better recompensed than the
latex coagulated on the ground, “there was no incentive for
the native to abandon his primitive extraction method”… and
so, they persisted in their corrupt practices. Bührer (1909)
estimated that it was impossible to improve the quality of
the rubber produced whilst “remaining in this vicious circle
which says to the buyer: ‘the product is always of poor quality, so I’ll pay the minimum for it’ and to the producer: ‘I’m
paid the minimum, so never mind the quality’”.
Endangered species?
From 1898, Girod-Genet was writing of Euphorbia
intisy: “this plant has become extremely rare”. What is more,
he announced, without any compunction, the imminent destruction of the ecosystems and the disappearance of the rubber species. As early as 1899, the geographer Zimmermann
confirmed the increasing scarcity of this species, which
was responsible for the “sudden commercial prosperity of
Fort-Dauphin between 1890 and 1896. Unfortunately, in a
matter of years the reserves from entire centuries have been
destroyed, leaving intisy, which grew right up to the walls of
Fort-Dauphin, only to be found to the west of Mandraré or at
some five to six days walk inland. At the same time, rubber
production, which equalled 400 tonnes in 1892 and 1893,
fell noticeably to 168 tonnes in 1896”.
Perrier de la Bâthie, in a report to the director of the
Department of Colonisation in October 1912 relating to a
prospecting mission between Fenerive and Maroantsetra,
raised the alarm over the “complete and irremedial dissappearance of the whole rubber species in the east” (Perrier de
la Bâthie, 1912a).
Professor Lecomte (1929) of the Académie des Sciences
spoke of “plants currently or previously used by man”, and
in particular of Euphorbia intisy, that “have almost entirely
disappeared due to thoughtless devastation”. Bigorne, in
1931, reviewing the products derived from the Malagasy
forest, quoted “for the record” the rubber species, “which
have almost totally disappeared”, and Decary (1966) stated
with regard to Euphorbia pirahazo that this tree “has not
been reviewed by botanists for a fair few years”. Today, E.
intisy species does not appear to be particularly endangered, but E. pirahazo is always considered critically endangered (Haevermans, 2003; IUCN, 2015).
The culprit was clearly singled out as the native. For
Girod-Genet (1899), “the majority of plants containing rubber, resins or latex of use to industry were subject to barbaric exploitation by the natives. Not only were they expected
to produce far greater annual yields than they should have
been, but they were even destroyed to obtain, in one go, the
greatest amount of saleable product”. Lieutenant Bührer
(1909) denounced “the lamentable exploitation of rubber
plants by the natives”. In 1911, Bourdariat spoke of the
Malagasy forest as a “precious capital abusively exploited by
the natives”. Although, sometimes, a more subtle and less
Manichean stance was taken. Prudhomme (1899/1900) and
Perrier de la Bâthie (1931) went as far as to admit that the
colonists were as much to blame as the natives. Likewise,
Decary (1926) held “natives and Europeans”, “whites and
blacks” equally responsible for pillaging the resource. This
view is confirmed by Fremigacci (1998) who shows that, only
too often, the colonist is both the backer and the beneficiary
of these collections.
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Conservation and valorization
of the species from utopia
to inapplicability
Acknowledgement of the disappearance of rubber species, and more generally the decline of the Malagasy forests,
provoked a very swift reaction (Jarosz, 1993; Kull, 2000).
Politicians put forward a legislative corpus aimed at protecting the species and organising sustainable management of
the ecosystems. The agronomists devised a set of strategies
to develop cultivation of the most interesting species, in
order to perpetuate the sector in Madagascar.
Repressive but unenforceable policies
Where the rubber species were concerned, the first
legislative decisions were taken as early as 1897. An order
dated 3rd July required of each producer that he “be obliged
to plant every year, at his own expense, three times as many
precious species as the number of trees felled in the course
of the year”. The ministerial order dated 10th February 1900,
which set out the Malagasy forestry regulations, specified the
methods of bleeding rubber trees and lianas “in order to avoid
destroying the producing plants”. It also decreed that felling
or uprooting rubber plants could be punishable with imprisonment for between one and ten days. These points were
confirmed in the order dated 20th September 1907 regulating
the exploitation of forestry products and by the ministerial
order of 28th August 1913 relating to the forestry regulations
in Madagascar. This reiterated the requirement for planting in
each farmed plot a minimum of 150 rubber trees or lianas per
hectare, instituting an annual tax of ten centimes per hectare
farmed, payable in advance and provided for a penalty of up
to five years imprisonment for “anyone damaging, burning,
ransacking or destroying […] forests managed or artificially
repopulated with rubber species”.
But the majority of decisions, as repressive as they
were, remained ineffective, due to the administration having
too few agents to enforce them: in the years between 1896
and the 1920s, the number of forestry officers appointed to
the island varied from one to two and the number of officials, from two to five (Lavauden, 1934). Moreover, Captain
Jeannot (1901) was under no illusion as to the impact these
laws would have on the rubber collectors: “it would be
unfeasible to compel natives as undisciplined as those involved in the harvesting of rubber to abide by rules, even the
simplest. […] A rubber hunter, camped out in the depths of
the forest, is only concerned with his own immediate needs
and will never take on a process which will yield less and
create extra work”.
Short lived agronomic research
From the agronomist’s point of view, scarcity of the
resource led to the development of a double approach in
Madagascar: (i) attempt to refine methods for preserving
and managing the natural ecosystems rich in local rubber
producing species, (ii) promote the introduction and acclimation of exotic species with an already identified potential.
These two approaches are neither original, nor specific to
Madagascar (Bergeret, 1993; Pouchepadass, 1993). They
correspond to the two major lines of action that scientists
and colonists were applying at the turn of the 20th century.
It was their ambition, out of a sense of national duty, to promote exploitation of the colonies’ resources to the advantage of the homelands’ emerging industries (Chevalier,
1930, 1946; Lavauden, 1941; Bonneuil and Kleiche, 1993).
Madagascar then became, in the same way as the whole of
the newly colonised and pacified regions, a land ripe for the
discovery of natural wealth, scientific exploration, domestication of exotic natural environments and agronomic innovation (Bergeret, 1993; Pouchepadass, 1993).
The work undertaken was founded on a principle declared
by Jean Dybowski, the director of the Colonial Garden in Nogentsur-Marne, in France (1897): “Certain species are bled for
rubber. Fibres from the palm trees are harvested for raffia […].
And one becomes so used to harvesting products which come
spontaneously that sometimes one deduces from it that this is
what rational exploitation of our colonies consists of […] It is not
enough to satisfy oneself with harvesting products that are freely
available, one must cultivate”. To quote yet another, the agronomist and statesman, Eugène Tisserand, wrote in 1902: “the
forests that produced gutta-percha are becoming depleted; the
rubber lianas under the devastating machete of bush runners
are receding in the face of the progressing invasion; if we don’t
hurry to repopulate, it won’t take much for our most precious
species to disappear, exhausted by excessive exploitation” (from
Bonneuil and Kleiche, 1993).
And so it was that Madagascar and the rubber species
represented a vast subject of investigation during the early
part of the 20th century. The research proposals were directed three ways: (i) conservation and management of forest
ecosystems rich in rubber species, (ii) domestication and
cultivation of local species and (iii) introduction of exotic
species with previously identified potential and for which
cultivation was already controlled.
Delmas and Duffart (1908b) recommended the first solution: “The forest, alone, in its integrity – such as nature made it
with its undergrowth, its dead layer, even its parasites (plant and
animal), thinly yet robustly populated with 100 to 150 rubber
plants per hectare – is and should remain the supreme resource
of rubber production”. In the Menabe (western Madagascar),
this proposal began to take effect at the beginning of the 20th
century. The administration tried to bring about the transfer of
forestry management to local populations and farmers: “The
forests in each region will be divided between the villages of
that region, each village fixing the boundaries of its ‘faritany’,
the village chief will then allot shares of the forest to his people”.
The administration compelled the Sakalava collectors to regenerate the stands exploited by propagating the major rubber
species from layering or cutting. And so, in March 1905, 7,000
layers were planted, each one registered in the owner’s name
(Rey, 1905). These proposals were upheld by the authorities
since the order dated 3rd July 1897 and the ministerial order of
the 28th August 1913 obliged farmers to aid the regeneration of
exploited species. These attempts at managing the ecosystems
rich in rubber species were, nonetheless, to no avail.
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Other foresters, such as Thiry (1903), appeared to be
optimistic about the feasibility of cultivating Malagasy species:
“Madagascar is particularly privileged. The best of our lianas,
which up until the present day have remained unidentified,
even botanically, are […] liable to hold their own against those
rubber species currently mostly highly considered. Landolphia
is easy to cultivate […], and suffers less hazards than any other
cultivation yet attempted on the island”. Thiry estimated at
400,000 hectares the surface area of forest in the east suitable
for planting and considered cultivating Malagasy lianas to be
more economically beneficial than planting major exotic species (Hevea, Castilloa, Ficus or Kickxia [other name Futumnia]).
This point of view was also defended by Bourdariat (1911) and
Louvel (1910), who advocated more than an assisted regeneration system, but envisaged implementing real “rubber reserves”
by domesticating local species and, more specifically, lianas
of the Landolphia species. In fact, a large base of preliminary
knowledge was obtained, at that time, from various studies on
the aptitude to propagation (sowing, layering, cutting), types of
behaviour and methods of exploitation of these species (age
of exploitability, harvesting heights, management of suckers…)
and even on the likely economic profitability of such reserves.
This idea was picked up on by Perrier de la Bâthie and Jumelle
(1907) who considered it possible to create groves of Malagasy
rubber species from scratch in savanna zones. Griess (1907)
proposed, along the same lines, to launch the cultivation of
Euphorbia intisy, for which cutting was reputedly very easy (a
point which was never confirmed).
However, all these fine projects were never
implemented. The risks in launching a new cultivation and the need for investment with only longterm returns must have discouraged the colonists.
This explains why some envisaged the introduction and creation of plantations of rubber
species according to the model implemented in
Southeat Asia (Griess, 1907; Bourdariat, 1911;
Fauchère, 1911; Perrier de la Bâthie, 1912;
Hamet and Josse, 1913). The candidate species
featured Hevea brasiliensis (illustration 3), but
also the ceara rubber tree (Manihot glaziovii),
Castilloa elastica, Funtumia elastica from Africa,
as well as Ficus elastica from Asia.
Introduction trials were carried out under
various edaphic and climatic conditions in the
years from 1888-1902 (Prudhomme, 1899/1900;
Perrier de la Bâthie and Duchêne, 1908;
Fauchère, 1911) often with contradicting results.
According to Perrier de la Bâthie and Duchêne,
(1908), the ceara rubber tree developed satisfactorily in the Marovoay region. Whilst Perrier de la
Bâthie (1912) considered hevea and ceara took
well in the Sambirano. Fauchère (1911) even
pointed out that “it seems that these trees, if correctly cultivated, should be able to provide yields
which compare to those obtained in the countries
where they are cultivated”.
However, Hamet and Josse (1913) were
much more sceptical, concluding that in Madagascar, “it has not yet been proven that the
American species are able to acclimate profitably”. Prudhomme (1899/1900) was altogether doubtful on the success of cultivating rubber species. He advised, moreover, for
the east coast “cultivation which was better known and with
more guaranteed success, such as that of vanilla, cocoa, cloves and coffee”.
It was, on proof of evidence, the latter option which
turned out to be justified: no economic development ever
came of these trials. Little more than 800 hectares of plantation were counted in 1908 (Fauchère, 1911) and no rubber
producing programme ever saw the light of day in Madagascar.
Some small scale plantations were established in the
1930s on the eastern and northwest coasts but these rapidly
disappeared due, in all likelihood, to the high prevalence of
typhoons (Donques, 1975). Madagascar was evidently not
a good candidate for hevea rubber tree culture compared
to Southeast Asia or West and Central Africa even if some
people believed in the idea (Lecat, 1951). Furthermore,
two potential opportunities which might have led to a large
rubber development programme failed. The first was the
resource’s scarcity during the Second World War (see infra),
which could not be exploited as there was too little time for
plantations to be established. The second was the loss of
Indochina by France in 1954, which prompted French rubber companies to diversify their supply to Africa, but with
Madagascar too far away, it offered less advantages in comparison to the Ivory Coast or Cameroon.
Illustration 3.
An example of hevea introduced in the trial garden
at Tamatave, in the bleeding phase at the turn of 20th
century (Foiben-Taosarintanin’I Madagasikara collection,
Antananarivo, copyright FTM).
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The naturalists get involved
to compensate for the incompetence
of the authorities
Naturalists have always reprimanded slash and burn cultivation (tavy) traditionally practised by Malagasy peasants and
considered a prime factor in deforestation (Perrier de la Bâthie,
1921; Humbert, 1927; Gade, 1996; Kull, 2000). The practices
related to rubber collection were the first cause of destruction
of the ecosystems for economic ends. They added a new dimension to the concerns of nature conservationists, who strongly
doubted the colonial administration’s capacity to ensure the
preservation of Madagascar’s biological heritage, because as
Perrier de la Bâthie (1931) highlighted without any illusions, “in
Madagascar more than anywhere, there is a gulf separating the
written law from its effective application”.
This situation arose generally from the naturalists’
awareness of the overexploitation and degradation of the
Malgasy forests but it can be assumed that their stance was
influenced by the issue of rubber.
Two direct consequences of this distrust can be
highlighted, which are not inconsequential for the Malagasy
environmental policies of that era.
The first is the emergence of a very pessimistic discourse
on the protection of Malagasy biodiversity. It should not be
overlooked, and it is rarely documented, that the catastrophist tone of this discourse was intentionally over-stated, as
it was intended, in the minds of the naturalists, to convince
a body (administrators and civil servants) judged “too often
apathetic and cautious”, as reported by Perrier de la Bâthie
(quoted by Lacroix, 1938). This position, moreover, converges
with another quote, typical of Perrier de la Bâthie, who in 1928
dramatised the situation by proposing to abandon the forest
to the exploiter because in any case, “the climatic conditions,
the customs of the natives, the self interest of the peasants
and the indifference of the leaders, all condemn the forest to
extinction, anyway”. In actual fact, the naturalists seemed
not to trust the politicians to take and apply the conservative measures they were recommending. In their eyes, the
political powers appeared very amateurish in the way they
went about implementing the regulations in order to ensure
the conservation of the biological heritage. So, Lavauden, in
1931, claimed that “it’s about time the authorities took stock
of the real social danger in neglecting these massive degradations and in abandoning […] the evolution of the vegetation
cover to the vagaries of habit, preconceptions and trends.” In
the same spirit, Roger Heim (1935), the deputy director of the
Muséum d’Histoire Naturelle, in Paris, wrote: “It is likely that
one day, in Madagascar, as elsewhere, the entire responsibility for technical services will finally be entrusted to men who
are specialised and competent. But when it comes to the forest
the implications are particularly serious in that the solution
cannot wait. It’s now or never; either there is an immediate
improvement or there won’t be any at all”.
Hence, and this is the second consequence, it is out of
defiance of the legislation in place and those responsible for
applying it that the naturalists imposed the idea of creating
“nature sanctuaries”. These were intended to “provide lifelong protection against exploitation”, and were therefore
established in uninhabited areas, with difficult access, in
order to dissuade any “temptation to cultivate or exploit,
and hence any complaints from present or future occupants”
(Lacroix, 1938). Perrier de la Bâthie (1912a) suggested as
early as 1912 the creation of a network of forestry reserves
which would serve as “refuges” for the precious species and
in particular rubber species. The first network was established in 1927 and consisted in ten reserves covering a surface area of approximately 350,000 hectares. It had been
conceived with a view to preserving evidence of primitive
fauna and flora. These reserves were free from all rights of
usage; hunting, fishing and mining were all forbidden, as
was picking wild plants (article 4 of the ministerial order
dated 31st December 1927). The order made provision for
the reserves to be placed under the auspices of the Muséum
d’Histoire Naturelle, in Paris, in order to ensure the longevity
of the action (Petit, 1928; Lecomte, 1929). This was because,
had they had been entrusted exclusively to the forestry service, they “would be left to themselves and there would soon
be nothing more left of them but a puff of smoke and a pile
of ashes” (Perrier de la Bâthie, 1931). In this, Madagascar
was at the vanguard, as one of the first countries in the world
to possess a network of wildlife sanctuaries, and in Africa,
was preceded only by the Albert National Park in the Belgian
Congo (Perrier de la Bâthie, 1931) and the Kruger National
Park in South Africa (Humbert, 1933; Anonymous, 2006).
It would be nonetheless stretching the imagination to
suggest that the mere creation of the first Malagasy reserves
was influential in protecting the Malagasy rubber heritage
and thus able to explain the regeneration of its production capacity in 1943. The surface area of these reserves
remained static at 353,579 ha (0.006% of the island’s surface) until the Second World War, and then only increased
from 1956-8 (ANGAP, 2001). Whilst one of the reasons put
forward for their installation was, as stated by Lecomte
(1929), to combat the “disappearance of plants currently
or previously used by man”, as in the case of Euphorbia
intisy, “which was virtually wiped out in a matter of years”,
the size of the reserves and the limited means employed for
overseeing and managing them, as reported by Perrier de
la Bâthie (1931), will have most certainly reduced the effectiveness of the political measure.
When the conservation of heritage
is solvable in the national interest
However, certain factors in the history of Malagasy
rubber show that scientific discourses are not infallible. The
following historical points demonstrate how the naturalists,
from 1943 onwards, under obligation to have Madagascar
participate in the war effort were compelled to contradict their own discourse. They were forced to admit that
the catastrophism they had been disseminating since the
1920s concerning the destruction of the rubber species was
unfounded. And worse still, they became actively involved in
the promotion of rubber collection.
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H ISTO IR E D U C AO U TC H O U C D E MA DA G A S C A R / L E P OI NT S U R …
It is possible to detect, in figure 3, a brief yet distinct recovery in Malagasy and African rubber production during the years
from 1943-1945, simultaneous with the dramatic fall in the output from Asian hevea plantations. This fall can be explained by
the Japanese occupation of Southeast Asia from 1942 during
which they took control of around 90% of the Asian hevea plantations (Bouvier, 1947). Rubber production in the occupied
countries (Malaysia, Dutch East Indies, Thailand and French
Indochina) dropped henceforth from 1,390 tonnes in 1941 to
21 tonnes in 1945 (Bouvier, 1947). As a result, the Western
powers turned to the past production zones of forest rubber in
order to compensate for the deficit in primary material.
When the USA entered the war on the 7th December
1941, rubber was considered a strategic material, the absence
of which represented a serious threat to national security.
The Rubber Survey Committee was created in 1942 and the
country signed an agreement with Brazil aimed at reviving
production in the Amazonian forest, as well as promotion of
guayule in the Sertao area (Dean, 1987; Serier, 1993). This
agreement put Brazil under obligation to revive its natural
rubber producing sector from a population estimated at two
hundred million naturally growing heveas, which were to be
harvested by a veritable army of “troops of rubber”. The rubber produced was exported exclusively to the USA and thus
the whole of Central and South America was engaged in the
war effort producing rubber for the USA (Dean, 1987).
The British and French African colonies (French
Equatorial Africa and French West Africa gained independence in 1940 and 1942 respectively) (Thobie et al., 1990)
revived their productions of forest rubber (which underwent
the same development and recession as Malagasy rubber).
The Belgian Congo produced 9,400 tonnes of forest rubber
in 1944 (Serier, 1993).
As for Madagascar, a six-month long military campaign (from May to November 1942) by British and South
African troops culminated in the surrender of the French
Vichy government, after which the island was placed under
Gaullist occupation (Brown, 2000). At the beginning of 1943,
General Legentilhomme, the new governor of Madagascar,
undiplomatically declared “there is an obligation for the
natives to contribute to the war through restored discipline,
increase in the output of labour and maximisation of productivity” (Thobie et al., 1990). This war effort was accomplished
by recourse to forced labour, the requisitioning of harvests
(in particular, rice) and the resumption of natural rubber collection (François, 1945; Guillermin, 1947; Moranche, 1947;
Thobie et al., 1990; Brown, 2000).
In 1942, when the war effort became a national priority, there was a change in naturalist discourse. A Rubber
Committee (“Comité du Caoutchouc”) was created which
published in 1943 and 1944 instructions “for maximising
production of the best quality Malagasy rubber”. The botanist Pierre Boiteau distributed at the time, under the seal
of the Governor General of Madagascar, a study on the
Malagasy rubber species, which could be read as a guide
destined for use by farmers (Boiteau, 1943). These documents ironically make no reference to the alarmist scientific
publications of the previous years. The legislative corpus
was more concerned then with providing a framework for
the promotion of rubber collection. An order providing for
the regulation of the exploitation, trade and distribution of
rubber in the colony and dependencies of Madagascar was
instituted on 3rd November 1942. It authorised, in blatant
contradiction of the previous discourse, native cooperatives
to exploit rubber plants in the national forests, which were
neither allocated, nor classified as natural reserves. It regulated the methods of harvesting and preparing the rubber:
uprooting and felling prohibited trees, obligation to cut the
lianas at ground level and tap the trees, obligation to prepare the rubber in folds, ban on mixing different latexes,
authorisation of only two methods of coagulation; acid or
heating. Hence, natural rubber production was revived from
1942, with output peaking at 812 tonnes in 1944 (figure 3),
yet representing only 0.2% of world output, compared to the
24,000 tonnes produced in Brazil in 1943 (Deans, 1987).
And so, after twenty years of alarmist discourse predicting
the irreversible destruction of the ecosystems, the Malagasy
forests were once more producing rubber. The same went
for the forests of the French African colonies (Aubréville,
1949). At that same time (1943), it is worth noting that the
USA attempted to cultivate a species of Malagasy rubber,
Cryptostegia grandiflora (Compagnon, 1986), in Haiti.
Today history repeats itself
but lessons are soon forgotten
The birth, rise and subsequent extinction of the rubber
sector, at the turn of the 20th century, was the first case of
exploitation and exportation of a natural Malagasy resource
for industrial ends. The setting up of this sector coincided
with the development of naturalist and conservationist
thinking, which is still dominant to this day (Kull, 2000).
Today a similarity can be observed in the determination
by politicians to ensure the preservation of the Malagasy
biological heritage. Madagascar was one of the first countries in the world to equip itself with a network of nature
reserves, starting in 1927 (Kull, 1996).
There is continued evidence of this in recurrent proposals for the creation of new protected sites (ANGAP,
2001; Randrianandianina et al., 2003 ; Nohatrarivo, 2004).
Likewise, the Durban Declaration of September 2003, made
by the head of state during the world congress on protected
areas, announcing his determination to extend the coverage of Madagascar Protected Area System from 1.7 million
hectares to more than 6 million hectares decreed on 17th
October 2008, follows in the same vein. This objective mobilises numerous local and international capabilities (BorriniFeyerabend and Dudley, 2005a, 2005b). These observations highlight a paradoxical situation in which, despite an
early awareness of the need, and constant efforts over the
past 80 years, to preserve Madagascar’s biological heritage,
the situation is judged at present to be critical. This ranks
Madagascar amongst the “hottest hotspots” of global biodiversity (Myers et al., 2000).
Finally, in a last observation, it can be noted that once
launched, the process elaborated during the rubber producing enterprise: revealing the value of a natural resource, its
39
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F O CUS / HISTO RY O F RUB B ER IN M A DA GA SC A R
exploitation, and subsequent impoverishment of the biological heritage, proved irreversible. All the fine discourses and
attempts at sustainably managing the ecosystems, domesticating high performing species and installing cultivation
based on high-potential exotic species were ineffective at
arresting the process. Consequently, beyond proposing
technical solutions for prolonging the Malagasy rubber sector, no apparent determined efforts in the economic sphere
for investment in the field ever materialised. The transition
from a context of instantly profitable, investment free rubber collected by a native workforce, in a de facto context of
free access to the resource, towards one involving the establishment of cultivation with an unpredictable return on
investment did not come about. Guaranteeing the protection of Malagasy rubber species has not been accomplished
by scaremongering, repressive legislation, or networks of
protected areas, but by pure economic realism, which has
simply condemned an area of production that has become
unprofitable. This is not a new or recent observation, but one
which has already been put forward in relation, for example,
to the extraction of rubber in Amazonia (Homma, 1992).
And yet, sadly, whist the history of rubber is one that has
been forgotten, one need only substitute Prunus africana
for rubber to see the whole sorry scenario repeating itself,
as the bark is exploited for its therapeutic properties in the
treatment of benign prostatic hyperplasia in northern hemisphere countries (Stewart, 2003; Péchard et al., 2005). This
species is now classified on Appendix II of the CITES… And
maybe tomorrow, it will be the turn of tsiperifery, Malagasy
wild pepper, recently come to the attention of the world’s
top chefs and luxury spice merchants alike, the unhindered
collection of which is beginning to cause concern (QualiREG,
2011; Ceuppens, 2014).
Acknowledgements
This study was conducted by the Dispositif de Recherche et
d’Enseignement en Partenariat “DP Forêts et Biodiversité”,
a collaboration between the University of Antananarivo, the
Fofifa, and the Cirad. It was supported by the French Ministry
of Foreign Affairs (“Forma” and “Parrur” FSP projects). Thanks
to the NGO Words for Solidarity for translation services.
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