Plantation Crops

Tapping and processing

• Latex is a milky white dispersion of rubber in water which is harvested by the process of tapping.
• Containers:

  Coconut shell, Polythene cups. These containers are generally used to collect latex in Indian estates. Collected latex is later transferred to clean buckets two or three hours after tapping.

• Latex coagulum rubber / Field coagulum includes;

  Normally 15 to 25 per cent of total crop constitutes tree lace ,shell scrap and earth scrap which together is called as field coagulum rubber.

  1) Tree lace: The latex which gets dried up on the tapping panel.
  2) Shell scrap: The latex which dried up in the collection cups.
  3) Earth scrap: The latex that is split and/ or overflowed on the ground (earth scrap) which gets dried up. It is also collected once in a month or so. <>

  Marketable forms of natural rubber includes; (Rubber forms processed for marketing)

  # Sheet rubber: Prepared by addition of anticoagulants viz., Ammonia, Sodium Sulphate and Formalin.
  # Crepe rubber : When coagulum is passed through creeping machine,
  # Latex Concentrates/ Preserved field latex : Obtained by centrifuge machine,
  # Block Rubber/ Crumb rubber:

• Anticoagulants: It is a chemical added to latex to prevent pre-coagulation before it is processed.
  Eg: Ammonia, Sodium Sulfate, Formalin etc.