What is the position of natural rubber vis–vis synthetic substitutes?
Natural rubber forms just 25 per cent of the worlds requirement; the rest is made up of synthetic rubber items from petroleum products. But natural rubber is still essential for certain products – nearly 50-to-60 per cent of auto and truck tyres is natural rubber. Does the Indian rubber industry face any problems? From 1947 the rubber industry has enjoyed government protection and is more or less self-sufficient. Globalisation brought about certain problems. Imports at much cheaper prices are now freely allowed. Lets take tyres for example. The imported brands are cheaper because our production costs are high. We cannot fight globalisation, but have to accept the challenge and work towards higher productivity while cutting down costs of production. The families of 60,000 farmers in the industry are affected, but the future can be bright with the ban on rubber imports and the expected rise in prices of synthetic rubber items. This can lead to the resurrection of the Indian rubber indust
