Hainan's First Rubber Plantation

　　Hainan's First Rubber Plantation is located in Team 18, Potang Work Area, Dongtai Farm, Qionghai. It is China's first rubber plantation, with a history of 78 years to date. This plantation was personally founded by Mr. He Linshu, an overseas Chinese from Qionghai County, after he returned from Malaysia. Of the 4,000 rubber trees planted back then, having survived wars and natural disasters, only around a thousand remain today. After liberation, through years of effort, the descendants of these thousand trees have spread across four provinces and regions on and off the island, making outstanding contributions to the development of the country’s rubber industry.

　　Among these thousand rubber trees, one planted in Dongtai Hekouzui Team by the Hewan area in Huishan District can be called China’s “Rubber King.” It has a girth of 2.4 meters, a height of about 30 meters, and six branches about 60 to 70 centimeters thick growing at a height of three meters. It now yields at least 40 kilograms of dry rubber per year, over six times the average output of a single rubber tree.

　　Hainan's First Rubber Plantation

　　In 1950, shortly after Hainan’s liberation, the state established Dongtai Farm on the foundation of the Qiongan Rubber Plantation, which also has a history of 34 years to date. The current Dongtai Farm boasts lush and thriving growth of trees, rubber, and tea, representing a high-standard, modernized rubber plantation. Having endured a century of changes, these veteran trees are living witnesses to the hard-fought pioneering history of China’s rubber industry and are “living relics” of irreplaceable value.

　　Aside from the single remaining “Rubber King” in Yunnan, which has been placed under protection, these trees bear remnants of deformed tree knots and numerous scars from decades of tapping. Though they stand as testaments to a long history, they have not received the care they deserve. They silently stand on riverbanks and hillsides, still in a state of “waiting to die” due to external exploitation. The “Hainan Rubber King,” with a girth of 3 meters and a height of 20 meters, was blown down and killed by a typhoon in 1996, which is not only heartbreaking but should also serve as a wake-up call.