New-York tribune., 1908-06-04
PROFITS OF FORESTRY.

Sooe interesting estimates Of the profits or
forestry as it might be practised in the United
Kingdom are made by writer in The London
Times" in connection with the questions OF en-
ployment of labor and of the supply OF forest
PRODUCTS including wood pulp and cellulose, par
tcularIv showing as the writer assumes, the
advantages of forestry over some present uses OF
land There are he saws extensive areas which
are now devoted to sheep pasturage and which
because of their hiy contour are scarcely MT
for higher forms of agriculture. Ihese are
rented for from II to 30 cents an acre yearly,
and may be purchased outright for not more
than SO an acre. If such land were planted
with Scots pine which is about the cheapest OF
ell trees commonly grown for profit in the
United Kingdom, the writer reckons that ell
povment would at once and continually be given
10 at least ten times many men as are now
employed on it as shepherds. At the end OF
fifty wears moreover. the land which cost $40
an acre would have returned S21 IS an acre In
"thinnings" and would then have a standing
crop worth S246 % an acre.
How that would compare with the profits OF
sheen raising is not made clear OF course. it is
obvious that if the profits from forestry were
small in the first generation they would be much
larger thereafter. In Prussia forestry is prac-
tised by the state in a particularly thorough
manner and a net revenue of about $20OO0,OO0
n
profits of the woodland not all which should
no credited 10 it, There are various ancillary
and subsidiary industries of much Importance
which must be taken into account. Great Brit
ain has only two or three pulp mills and cellu-
lose factories and they use foreign wood for raw
material. while S14,0O0,00O worth Of wood pulp
is imported yearly. On the other hand, Ger
many has more than six hundred pulp mills and
seventy lone celuose factories, which consume
Sc 900 900 cubic feet of wood yearly, and yet
owing to the intelligent methods of forest cult
ure which are practised, the supply of wood is
rot being exhausted, but is increasing commen-
s,1rateIv with the increased demand. More
than one tenth of the entire population Of
Germany is profitably engaged i'll forestry and
the industries connected with and dependent
upon it.
These calculations are of no less but rather
greater suggestive interest to America than to
Great Britain, for the question of wood sup
Ply both for lumber and for pulp, is really more
urgent here than there. Nowhere in the world
have forest products of all kinds been so largely
used as here and in no other civilized land have
there been in modern times profiigate waste
fulneSS in cutting and clearing and short
sighted neglect of reforestatiOn The result
which was from the first inevitable if such meth
ods were persisted in is apparent in the
practical exhaustion of our timber supply and
our dependence upon foreign forests. The facts
that in five years the price OF our native supply
of spruce for pulp increased 122 per cent and
that our importations Of timber from Canada
increased 102 per cent eloquent. TO get
rich quick Americans tree culture may seem too
slow way of making money and the ultimate
returns from forest land too small But
Thoughtful industrial economists must see In
forestry an essential element of national pros
perity which it would be runous to neglect