# 'Cambodian forests fall victim to global demand for rubber tyres' **URL:** \ **Category:** General Discussion\ **Created:** [January 21, 2019, 5:32am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015 "2019-01-21T05:32:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![bing](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/cartalk/user_avatar/community.cartalk.com/bing/32/4619_2.png) [@bing](https://community.cartalk.com/u/bing)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 3:25am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015/21 "2019-01-23T03:25:32Z")
> [@George\_San\_Jose1](#): > > Didn’t Henry Ford own a big rubber plantation in Brazil in the early car days? Yeah him and Firestone. They were good friends. That’s why even into the 50’s Fords came from the factory with Firestone tires on it. A high school friends dad bought the Ford dealership back in the early 60’s and he had been a Firestone exec so there used to be a relationship. Guess that all went kaflooyee though with the Exploder. ---
**Author:** ![Scrapyard-John](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f6c823/32.png) [@Scrapyard-John](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Scrapyard-John)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 3:28am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015/22 "2019-01-23T03:28:41Z")
I didn’t read the entire article. But I wonder what percentage of tires are, or could be, recycled? We have a place locally that recycles tires. I’m not sure how much actually goes back into tire production vs other items, though. And they charge you $x/ton to take your tires. So maybe it’s not all that economically feasible to recycle them? ---
**Author:** ![George\_San\_Jose1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e5b9ba/32.png) [@George\_San\_Jose1](https://community.cartalk.com/u/George_San_Jose1)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 3:34am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015/23 "2019-01-23T03:34:58Z")
> [@Scrapyard\_John](#): > > I’m not sure how much actually goes back into tire production vs other items Isn’t the primary use of recycled tires for road pavement? ---
**Author:** ![Scrapyard-John](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f6c823/32.png) [@Scrapyard-John](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Scrapyard-John)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 3:40am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015/24 "2019-01-23T03:40:36Z")
I don’t really know. I was just thinking if we need more rubber for tires, it seems like used tires would be a logical source. But I know very little about tire recycling or tire production. I did ask the closest recycler what they used most of the tire material for. I don’t remember what the lady told me. But it wasn’t tires. ---
**Author:** ![RandomTroll](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/cartalk/user_avatar/community.cartalk.com/randomtroll/32/12184_2.png) [@RandomTroll](https://community.cartalk.com/u/RandomTroll)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 4:56am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015/25 "2019-01-23T04:56:50Z")
> [@bing](#): > > The world needs rubber, the Cambodians need jobs and industry. I don’t know that there’s any industry, just trees. A likelier outcome is a few poor-paying unskilled jobs and a few getting wealthy. The forest may not be useful for any other purposes. > [@bing](#): > > We should tell them they shouldn’t do that? The article didn’t say that anyone should tell the Cambodians to do anything, but to alert readers to the possible consequences. > [@bing](#): > > Minnesota has been growing corn though for a long time and the top soil is doing just fine. Because Minnesota’s farmers have managed their soil so as to preserve it, because they live on it and own it, aren’t sharecroppers working on land someone in St. Paul owns and doesn’t care what happens to. I used to live in Iowa; a friend’s father taught Ag at the high school. He had students bring in pictures of poor soil management. One of them was on his brother-in-law’s farm, won that year, (poorly managed drainage had gullied his soil), made an enemy - what BILs are for, I guess. I suspect some Minnesotans bungled too. > [@Scrapyard\_John](#): > > Nature generally recovers pretty quick. Clear the rubber tree farms and see how long it takes for the rainforest species to return. Quickly in geological time; long in the lifetime of a subsistence farmer. It won’t hurt me. > [@George\_San\_Jose1](#): > > Didn’t Henry Ford own a big rubber plantation in Brazil in the early car days? I wonder whatever happened to that? Fordlandia. There was a book about it a few years ago. It was a big failure. He set up a company town and tried to make them live the way he wanted his workers in the US to live. > [@Scrapyard\_John](#): > > You can see nature taking over again in some of the abandoned Detroit manufacturing plants. Check out the Packard plant, closed in '56. > [@Scrapyard\_John](#): > > I imagine ancient civilizations thought they were doing something that would have a long term impact on the world. Now we have to clear the jungle and dig into the dirt just to find a trace of them. If we’re willing to die out and leave the Earth alone for a few thousand years, it’ll recover completely > [@bing](#): > > him and Firestone. They were good friends A Ford son married a Firestone daughter. > [@Scrapyard\_John](#): > > But I wonder what percentage of tires are, or could be, recycled? We have a place locally that recycles tires. I’m not sure how much actually goes back into tire production vs other items, though. And they charge you $x/ton to take your tires. So maybe it’s not all that economically feasible to recycle them? I see a guy with a funky old stake-body driving around town (Albuquerque), full of old tires, hand-made sign on the side advertising tire recycling, so he seems to be making money on it. (He’s not in the phone book, so maybe not too much money.) In California you pay a recycling fee when you buy a tire to pay for its recycling. Ever heard of the Tracy tire fire? Turning latex into tire rubber is an irreversible process (at least way to expensive to reverse), you can’t re-use old rubber to make new tires. Most of it goes into pavement. I’ve read about some being used to make artificial reefs. ---
**Author:** ![Scrapyard-John](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f6c823/32.png) [@Scrapyard-John](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Scrapyard-John)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2019, 6:34am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015/26 "2019-01-23T06:34:34Z")
That old dude’s probably selling some of those tires for reuse. Maypop brand. 😬 [Previous page](https://community.cartalk.com/t/cambodian-forests-fall-victim-to-global-demand-for-rubber-tyres/133015.md?page=1)