World production of rubber. The increase in production of rubber between 1930 and 1940 parallels the growth of the automobile. In 1940 all but a few shiploads of the 1,000,000 long tons produced in the world came from Malaya, the Netherlands, the East Indies, Ceylon and other East Indian sources. The greatest part of this was shipped to the United States. Since the war, more than ninety-eight percent of our sources of supply of crude rubber have been lost