Going nuts about Brazil

QUESTION Why did Henry Ford build a town in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest? FORDLANDIA is a relic of the time when the car manufacturer Henry Ford tried to create his own rubber plant to supply his Michigan factories.

In the Twenties, tyre rubber was supplied by British companies working in South East Asia.

The area chosen for Ford’s rubber plantation was 6,000 square miles on the banks of the Tapajos River, a tributary of the Amazon. It took 18 hours to reach by riverboat from the nearest town.

In 1927, Ford, the richest man in the world, built his city aiming to create equivalent working conditions to those found in his American plants. His workers built modern homes, a hospital, swimming pool and shops and set up a mess hall serving American food.

Workers were paid 35 cents an hour – ten cents more than workers at the South East Asian rubber plants.

However, Ford’s attempts to impose US ideals on his 400 Brazilian workers were misjudged. The food disagreed with them, as did the strict rules on relationships, women and alcohol. They also protested about being forced to attend square dances.

They complained about the housing, which was different from their traditional homes that were raised off the forest floor to keep out insects and animals.

The final nail in the coffin was the fact that the soil was unsuitable for growing rubber trees. In 1934, Ford abandoned Fordlandia and moved operations to Belterra, eight miles away. This was a larger concern with 7,000 inhabitants and more than 2,000 workers.

Its rubber plantation reached the production stage in 1941, but the village and plantation were abandoned in 1945 when the project proved unprofitable.

While Belterra survives as a thriving tourist town, Fordlandia has been left to decay slowly. Jonathan Towey, Chelmsford,

Essex.

QUESTION Was the cartoon character Mr Magoo based on the comic magazine character Colonel Blimp?

FURTHER to the earlier answer, Mr Magoo was created in 1949 while Colonel Blink (not Blimp) ‘the short-sighted gink’, drawn by Tom Bannister, first appeared in the Beezer comic in 1958.

Blink, a short-sighted retired officer, was a combination of Colonel Blimp and Mr Magoo. Blink had similar physical characteristics to Blimp – he was large, round and bluff – but, like Mr Magoo, he had complete confidence in his perception. His adventures were an escalating sequence of disasters based on innocent and often well-meaning intent.

When the Beezer ceased publication, Colonel Blink moved to the Beano, but as a young lad called Blinky. Steve Mitchell, London SE8.

QUESTION What is the cost of producing a €1 coin?

IT costs the best part of €2 to produce a €1 coin and in fact, all the euro coinage costs more to produce than its face value. However, the European Central Bank and national banks in the eurozone Rubberstamped: Henry Ford (right) made workers attend square dances countries are always very coy about how much it costs to produce the currency.

The Central Bank of Ireland began producing euro coins in September, 1999, in anticipation of the euro becoming Ireland’s legal currency on January 1, 2002. Between September, 1999, and the start of the euro in circulation here, the bank produced over a billion coins with a value of over €230million. All these coins were produced at the Mint in Sandyford, south Co. Dublin. All Irish euro coins feature the harp, in a design by the late Jarlath Hayes.

Little has ever been revealed about the cost of producing euro currency, although Italy disclosed some striking statistics in 2013, which showed that since it had started making euro coins, it had spent €362million making cent coins with a face value of only €174million. Italy disclosed that it was costing 5.2c to make a two cent coin and 5.7c to mint a five cent coin. The European Central Bank, in consultation with national banks in the euro countries, decides how much euro currency should be produced. Production forecasts for the years ahead are made from forecasts published by these various national banks, which are crosschecked with a central forecast from the ECB.

But euro currency used in a particular country doesn’t have to be produced there. The only euro banknote that has been printed in recent times in Ireland has been the €20 note, which is also produced by Belgium, Spain and Poland. Over the past two years, the Central Bank Commission has been reviewing its strategy for printing bank notes and the management at the mint in Sandyford had recommended a winding down in print production.

This decision was strongly criticised by Siptu, which said that the decision to close the printing works was strategically flawed. The Central Bank isn’t seeking redundancies and says that affected staff can be redeployed elsewhere, while staff who want to leave its employment can take a voluntary severance package.

The Central Bank says that a majority of the bank notes used in Ireland are already printed elsewhere. There’s no timeline in place for the suggested closure, adds the Central Bank and the whole matter is currently the subject of negotiations at the Workplace Relations Commission.

Any decision to stop printing bank notes here won’t impact on the production of Irish euro coins, adds the Central Bank, or on the supply of cash to the national cash cycle. Over two years ago, the Central Bank decided to phase out one cent and two cent coins, even though they remain legal tender. Retailers started rounding up or down to the nearest five cents. Ireland joined six other eurozone countries that had already made the same decision.

Between 2001 and 2015, the mint at Sandyford had made over €30million worth of one and two cent coins, which accounted for 85% of all coins production in Sandyford. It was revealed that each one cent coin cost 1.65 cents to make, while a two cent coin cost 1.94 cents to mint. Pat Maloney, Dublin 9.

IS THERE a question to which you have always wanted to know the answer? Or do you know the answer to a question raised here? Send your questions and answers to: Charles Legge, Answers To Correspondents, Irish Daily Mail, Embassy House, Herbert Park Lane, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4. You can also fax them to 0044 1952 510906 or you can email them to charles.legge@dailymail.ie. A selection will be published but we are not able to enter into individual correspondence.