Each rubber tree produces about half a cup of latex per day. It is harvested by cutting the bark of the rubber tree and accumulating it into cups. However, when mass-harvested, latex is stored in tanks. In order to extract solid rubber from the liquid latex, formic acid is added to the sap to initiate the coagulation process which can take up to 12 hours. The natural latex processing technology is fairly simple: the coagulated product is processed through a set of rollers in order to remove the excess water.

The dehydrated material is further rolled in a textured roller to create thin sheets. The latex sheets are dried by either smoking or air drying. Chemicals such as ammonia are used as a preservative for natural latex and the treatment is called prevulcanization.

As a natural latex harvest annihilates forests and pollutes soil, air and water, as well as the trees being exposed to diseases and a shortage of workforce, scientists ought to find new, innovative yet more environment-friendly methods to produce latex.

As found in a study conducted by Wageningen University and Research and the Keygene company, one alternative method is extracting latex from flowers, namely dandelions, which contain a small amount of the latex needed to make rubber. In order to harvest latex from dandelion, Dutch scientists crossed the Russian dandelion, which has latex roots, with the Dutch dandelion for its size. Although the goal is to harvest 750 kilos of rubber per hectare, it is still a complex process that needs to be simplified to become profitable.