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Role of the The Malaysian Rubber Board in R & D
Introduction
Natural
rubber in the true sense is a science-based material, for it would not be
commercially viable without the input of a considerable technical effort
over many years. The application of agricultural science (plant breeding,
physiology, disease control, etc) has raised the productivity ten times
over that of the original importations of Hevea. Research into the processing,
properties and application of NR has helped the industry to maintain its
supremacy in the family of rubbers. Malaysia has been a leader in technical
progress since the industry started in the early years of the century. The
industry provides millions of ringgit annually to carry out such R&D
activities. The money is collected through a research cess of 3.85 sen
for every kilogram of rubber exported. It is used to finance research spearheaded
by the Malaysian Rubber Board (MRB).
MRB
is a government agency under the aegis of the Ministry of Primary Industries
established with the specific purpose of exercising overall control of the
research, technical development, market regulation and promotion work in
support of the Malaysian rubber industry. Although most of the industry
is in the hands of the private sector – either as estates or as smallholdings
– the health and vitality of this commodity is of prime importance to the
government. The MRB’s basic role is to assist the Ministry of Primary Industries
in its planning to ensure the future viability of this industry. Execution
of the plan lies with a number of agencies, namely RISDA, MARDEC and FELDA
while the MRB itself determines policies and executes programmes of research,
development, promotion, licensing and regulation and provides the necessary
funds in pursuit of its activities and functions of its operation units
viz the Rubber Research Institute of Malaysia (RRIM) and Tun Abdul Razak
Research Centre (TARRC).
The responsibilities
of the MRB are wide-ranging and include all aspects of the rubber industry
from production to end-usage. However, two main objectives are involved:
first, to promote and develop the rubber industry of Malaysia, and secondly,
to develop national policies and priorities for the orderly development
of the rubber industry of Malaysia.The structure of MRB has been streamlined
to allow these objectives to be carried out effectively. Production research
is centred in RRIM; developments and innovations resulting in higher productivity
and better product and processes are disseminated through MRB’s own extension
services; and end-use research facilities are located both in the West (in
TARRC) and at RRIM’s Technology Centre in Sungai Buloh, Selangor.
R&D Contributions
Increased productivity
Breeding
and selection provides one of the most fundamental approaches to modernisation
of the industry. The breeding and selection of high yielding cultivars and
new methods of propagation, planting and exploitation are carried out extensively
at the 1500 hectare RRIM Experiment Station. The aim of breeding and
selection is to continually upgrade planting materials until the theoretical
limit is approached. New genetic materials, collected from the Brazilian
forests in 1981, will enable plant breeders to evaluate new clones from
the now larger gene pool.
The most
significant achievement has been in developing new rubber varieties or clones.
High-yielding trees producing more than 3,500 kg per hectare per year and
disease-resistant clones have been developed by RRIM. In addition, remarkable
progress has been achieved in reducing the immaturity period from 96 to
54 months. Plantations throughout the country as well as rubber producing
nations have also adopted agro-management practice developed by RRIM. Work
on soil conservation and soil fertility has helped to restore ecological
balance and greening of barren land including enriching the soil.
Research in the mechanisation of rubber production
and collection has been given much attention. Low Intensity Tapping Systems
(LITS) are technologies promoted by RRIM to tackle the acute labour shortage
problem. The LIT Systems consist of three technologies, i.e. LIT d/6; RRIMFLOW
and REACTORRIM.
RRIM is also giving
priority to develop timber-latex clones to cope up with increasing demand
for wood as well as latex.
Strategic research
Genetic engineering and biotechnology have proved
resourceful in plant breeding, especially in the production of transgenic
plants that could produce valuable pharmaceuticals and certain types of
latex.
Improve in Quality
The
Standard Malaysian Scheme (SMR) introduced in 1965 by RRIM has revolutionised
the presentation, quality and marketing of NR. Under this scheme, rubber
is technically graded based on technical specifications instead of the traditional
visual grading system used for rubber sheets and remilled crepes. It is
essentially a quality control scheme which guarantees standards and improves
marketing so as to compete with the synthetic rubber industry.
New rubbers
In line
with the government's policy to increase the production of value-added locally,
RRIM together with TARRC in the United Kingdom, has developed new rubbers
such as epoxidised natural rubber (ENR), deproteinised natural rubber (DPNR),
thermoplastic natural rubber (TPNR), etc. These materials have opened up
new applications especially in heavy duty engineering including earthquake
isolators. Another important development is the liquid natural rubber (LNR)
which has several industrial uses.
Downstream
From its early beginnings as a tree gum used for
waterproofing articles and for making bouncing balls by the natives of South
America, natural rubber has evolved into a versatile industrial raw material
today. It is used in tens of thousands of products, ranging from the simple
elastic, rubber band to massive earthmover tyres.
Rubber
products manufacturing has been identified a priority industry in the Malaysian
Industrialisation Programme. The Government, through the RRIM, has established
a multi-million ringgit modern Technology Centre to help speed up its industrialisation
programme. Among other things, this centre provides advice on various aspects
of the manufacture of rubber products including process evaluation, product
design and testing.
A selection of the
manufacturing technology of rubber products which have been adopted by the
rubber industry are as follows:
- Engine mountings for isolation of engine vibrations from the rest
of the vehicle
- Cutless bearings for protection of the boat propeller shafts
- Lifejackets which use a low gravity microcellular NR/EVA blend
- NR rail pads which act as rubber cushions between the rail and concrete
sleepers
- Shooting range floor tiles to trap bullets
- Improved tyre valves for the automobiles
- Runway sealants based on NR and oil-resistant SR
- Oil palm bunch waste rubberised coils
- Radiator hoses based on NR and EPDM for automobiles
- Thermoplastic rubber-based paints for flexible rubber toys
- Rail crossing sealants based on NR and NBR
- Airbrake diaphragm compounds for use in air brake systems of motor
vehicles
- Exhaust hangers for flexible attachment of a vehicle exhaust to chassis
- Carfloor plugs for the Proton car
- Other rubber automotive components developed for the vendors of Proton
include weather strip, bushing, engine dipstick, side mirror housing,
etc
- Rainguard sealants that can accommodate the rubber tree trunk surface
irregularities
- Steering drive shaft bellow compounds which use ENR 50
- Tyre tread compounds based on 100% NR being adopted in the DMIB Kilomax
tyres
- NR-rich truck tyre precured treads (40:60 NR/BR blend) which perform
as well as 100% SR
- Relaxed modulus (MR 100) tester for rapid measurement of modulus
of rubber vulcanisate
- A bomb damper compound moulding for triggering pins in bombs for
Mindef
- Milk fat-resistant O-rings and valves based on ENR 50 for the milking
machines
- Rubber bridge bearings which are now widely used (over 35 000 pieces)
in Malaysia
- Seismic rubber bearings for earthquake protection of buildings
- NR latex-modified concrete, mortar and cement with improved flexural
and compressive strengths
- NR-based adhesives
- Natural rubberised bitumen for surfacing of road
- Development of non-sulphur essentially nitrosamine- and nitrosatable-free
formulations for prevulcanised latex
- Development of low extractable protein latex and refinement of processing
techniques like water leaching and improved chlorination to overcome
or circumscribe the occassional reported occurences of Type 1 allergy
attributed to the use of natural latex gloves. Associated with this
effort is the development of quantitative methodds (Bradford/Lowry/RRIM
modified Lowry/ SE-HPLC) of determining the total water extractable
protein at very low levels and immunological techniques (ELIZA/RAST)
for the assay of allergenic proteins
Waste Management
The RRIM is ever conscious of its responsibility
in helping the rubber industry to develop in an environment-friendly
way. R & D efforts in developing the cost-effective technologies
to rubber product factories are :
- Anaerobic and aerobic ponding cum rubber trap systems
- Aeration system for treatment of rubber effluent from factories
having limited land area
- Anaerobic digestion system for pre-treatment of rubber factory
effluent and recovery of bio-gas as an energy source
- Land application of nutrient-, element- and water-rich rubber
effluent in oil plam and rubber holdings
- Powdered rubber from waste coagulum generated from prevulcanised
latex production
- Serum powder for fertilizer application (and possibly other valuable
by-products) from latex serum in latex concentrate
- Chemicals (e.g. Quebrachitol) derived from latex serum
- Recycling of rubber product waste in partnership with the private
sector
Laboratory services
With
more than half a century of research and development work, LGM is in a position
to offer unique technological back-up facilities and information services
to extend the benefits of R&D to all sectors of the industry. RRIM maintains
a number of laboratories to render both internal R&D support as well
as to assist the rubber industry to continually improve the quality and
range of technically specified rubber production and develop new rubber
products. The RRIM also serves as an independent third-party certification
testing and sampling body. Some of the RRIM laboratories are accredited
to ISO/IEC Guide 25 quality management system under the national SAMM Laboratory
Scheme of the Malaysian Accreditation Council. RRIM is itself an accreditation
body for SMR laboratories under the SMR Scheme and the RRIM SMR Control
Laboratory is the Co-ordinating Laboratory under the International Rubber
Association (IRA) Scheme of Approved International Rubber Referee laboratories
for Technically Specified Rubber.
The
type of laboratory services available are:
- SMR testing/ round robin cross checks/ arbitration
testing/ regulation of SMR laboratories/ instrumentation calibration
for the SMR industry/ testing of specialty rubbers/ accreditation of
SMR and IRA referee laboratories
- Physical testing and sampling of rubber products/
round robin cross checks
- Rubber engineering testing for vendors
- Chemical analysis of rubber and rubber compounds/
rubber ingredients
- Latex testing
- Rubber effluent testing
Manpower and education
The
MRB is also a resource centre for the supply of trained, experienced and
highly qualified manpower for the rubber industry especially the downstream
rubber products sector. The Board's Training Centre in Sungai Buloh has
been involved in extension education since 1973. As a world leader of research
and development in natural rubber, the MRB is in a position to conduct any
form of training to fulfil every requirement of the NR industry. Courses
offered include plantation and industrial courses as well as attachment
training. In recent years, training of entrepreneurs on the manufacturing
of rubber products has been incorporated into the training programme in
line with the Industrial Master Plan. This is regarded as a form of transfer
of technology to the industry.
Future research
Future research will be geared to meet the changing
scenario of the rubber industry. Greater emphasis will be given to the downstream
sector R&D in tandem with the government's policy on industrialization
and value-added downstream activities. Notwithstanding this, selected areas
of R&D in the upstream sector will continue to be emphasized in order
to maintain the industry's competitiveness. Also, priority attention would
be given to projects which will lead to 'breakthroughs' in research findings.
In addition, R&D activities of the MRB will be
one that is industry-driven and relevant to industry's needs and requirements.
Concomitant with this greater emphasis will be given to commercialisation
of research findings.
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