The_Open_Door_deel1

-132-
agreement of March 1959 (all agricultural concession agreements
were -to be reviewed though later it was decided to concentrate
first on the 1926 Planting Agreement with Firestone), whereupon
LAC withdrew its proposal.
In November 1976 the Government again communicated to LAC that it
wanted to review its concession agreement, but after LAC/UNIROYAL
had convinced high ranking government officials, including the
President, William Tolbert, that if it was to accept the same
conditions as the Firestone Plantations Company it would feel
compelled to close down its operations in the country, the Government
backed down and left an unsatisfactory situation unchanged.
The company's major yearly contribution to the Treasury
had been a^negligable four thousand dollars for rental of its
concession area.
THE SALALA RUBBER CORPORATION
In 1959, the same year in which the Government granted a 600,000
acres and 70-year concession to the Italian financiers of the
Liberian Agricultural Company, it also signed a long-term
investment contract with two other European investors, the Dutchowned
N.V. Rubber Cultuur Maatschappij Amsterdam (RCM-Amsterdam),.
and the Nordmann, Rassmann and Company, from Hamburg (NRC-
Hamburg). These two companies in January 1960 founded a company
under Liberian laws, the Salala Rubber Corporation, in which they
took a 74? and 25? interest respectively (initially one percent
was taken by a Dutch national, A.E. van der Haagen). They assigned
to this company the concession by separate agreement of
March 25, 1960, in conformity with Article XI of the original
agreement of August 1, 1959 which was approved by the National
Legislature on May 4, 1960.
RCM-Amsterdam had owned a large rubber plantation in Indonesia, a
former Dutch colony, which it had been compelled to give up
during a flood of nationalistic measures in 1956 and 1957, and it
had decided to invest its capital and experience with rubber in
Liberia. The decision was made after it was found that the
country's soil was very suitable for the growing of rubber, its
climate ideal, and the political environment and investment
climate very attractive. Owing to its experience in Indonesia, it
was political prudence rather than insight into the limitations
of the investment possibilities in Liberia that had been responsible
for the relatively modest size of the concession area It obtained,
100,000 acres, which was much smaller than those granted
earlier by the Liberian Government to foreign investors (except
the concession given to Juan Jesus Ramos Associates). (28)
The concession agreement entitled the concessionaire for a period
of 70 years to two concession areas, one in the (then) Central
Province, between Yangwela-Pa (Gibi Mountains), Waung-Gliba and
the Borlalah River, the other in the Zorzor, Voinjama and
Kolahun Districts in the then Western Province, a total