Need for ‘Industrial’ Crops Grows

Scientists believe that a new generation of crops with strange names such as guayule, kenaf and jojoba may provide home-grown rubber for tires, newsprint for daily papers and lubricants for machines.

They also could provide thinners for paint, thickeners for ketchup, moisturizers for cosmetics--and income for U.S. farmers.

“This is the beginning of a whole new revolution in agriculture,” said Himayat Naqvi, president of the Assn. for the Advancement of Industrial Crops. “It will give farmers something different to grow, it will help our trade balance, reduce our dependence on foreign oil and improve our environment.”

Scientists, farmers and government officials met in Peoria earlier this month to discuss crops such as vernonia, cuphea and lesquerella. Chemicals from such plants can be refined to replace compounds derived from imported oil or from plants raised only in other nations.

However, there are few acres of these industrial crops in the United States and the government spends relatively little to develop them, said Naqvi, a plant breeder at the University of California at Riverside.