Slaughter tappingis an obsolete method of extracting large quantities ofnatural latexfromrubber treesin a forest environment. Before commercial exploitation of latex-bearing trees such asHevea brasiliensisin the Amazon Basin andFuntumia elasticain the Congo, native populations limited harvesting to non-lethal tapping of the latex. However, with the rising demand for rubber worldwide in the late nineteenth century,debt-slave"hunters" began tapping more intensively, using ladders to extract as much latex as possible from all areas of the tree, killing the tree as a result. This "slaughter tapping" resulted in the destruction of all latex-bearing trees across large swathes of sub-Saharan Africa and South America. Eventually, the establishment of rubberplantationsin theFar Eastmade "hunting" of naturally occurring rubber trees unprofitable, and the practice largely ceased in the early twentieth century.
References
edit- Hobhouse, Henry (2003, 2005). Seeds of Wealth: Five Plants That Made Men Rich. Shoemaker & Hoard. pp. 141–142.ISBN1-59376-089-2.