The Quest for Raw Materials in the British Paper Trade : The Development of the Bamboo Pulp and Paper Industry in British India up to 1939

Abstract

The British paper trade history was defined since the mid-1850s by a quest for a new raw material to replace rags. The requirements of the paper trade were first met by a discovery that esparto grass from Spain, and later from North Africa, could be utilised in British mills. Beginning in the late 1870s, the success of using esparto encouraged mill developments in British India. The increased dependence on imported wood pulp, the likelihood of a pulp famine, and the consequent increase in price for imported wood pulp drew attention to the possibility of making commercial volumes of good quality pulp from indigenous Indian grasses. Bamboo began being treated after the First World War, when the Government of India offered financial incentives to induce the creation of a bamboo pulp and paper industry. The bamboo pulping process entered the period of commercial production in 1922 but developed in an economically viable manner only after tariff protection had become effective in 1925. The technology was developed under British auspices, but was later adopted by Indian paper producers in response to the rising costs of imported wood pulp.