Trade Miscellaneous

RavCorp give our clients access to an impressive range of regularly traded materials but also offer a selection of Rubber, Tea and Diamond products from suppliers around the world.

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Trade Rubber

The primary source of natural latex which is used to create rubber is the para rubber tree, a plant native to the central and South American regions. Although native to the Americas, in 1876 thousands of seedlings were germinated at Kew Gardens in London and taken to Asia.

Cultivation in Asia grew rapidly and now, Asia is the world’s largest producer of natural rubber with Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand accounting for 72% of all natural rubber production worldwide.

In 2005 there was 21 million tonnes of rubber produced worldwide. A total of 58% of this was produced synthetically with the remaining 42% produced naturally.

Synthetic rubber is becoming increasingly prominent in the world economy and is made through a process of polymerisation.

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Trade Tea

Tea is taken from the evergreen tropical tea plant from the Camellia family, a native of both China and India which has green shiny pointed leaves.

When growing wild, tea is best suited in regions with a warm, humid climate with a yearly rainfall of around 1 meter. Optimum tea growing conditions are considered to be deep, light, acidic and well-drained soil. Given these conditions, tea will grow at altitudes of up to 5,000ft. It is widely considered that the highest quality tea grows at these higher elevations as the plants grow slowly due to the lack of oxygen and produce a better flavor.

Once matured, only the top 1 - 2 inches of the tea plant is picked, once harvested new buds start to grow every 7 – 10 days during the growing season which is typically between November and May.

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Trade Diamonds

Diamond is the hardest natural material known to man and the third hardest know material behind the artificially created aggregated diamond nanorods and ultrahard fullerit.

There are 2 different types of diamond, natural and synthetic. Natural diamonds are diamonds that are formed naturally in the earth, synthetic diamonds are diamonds created through man made processes, however both types are considered to be true diamonds.

The natural formation of diamond requires carbon rich materials to be exposed to extremely high pressure, usually ranging between 45 and 60 kilobars and at temperatures ranging between 900 and 1300°C. These conditions are most readily available in the lithospheric mantle below relatively stable continental plates and at the site of a meteor strike.

Around 49% of diamonds are found in central and southern Africa, although considerable sources have also been found in Canada, India, Russia, Brazil and Australia.