Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-06-29
The Timber Crisis
r. HE only time to prepare effectively
against crises is before they arrive.


n If it is well-nigh too late to prevent
exhaustion of this country's timber re-
sources still there will never be better
time or better hope than now for averting
that disaster and repairing the havoc already
made. Action prompt and vigorous will
probably accomplish much; continued delay
will certainly put the situation beyond saw
ing.
So dependable an authority as Mr.. Philip
w. Ayres, of New Hampshire, practical
forester as we'll as an able economist, de-
cIares that as a nation "we are no longer in
a position of self-defense in the matter of
timber" Writing in the current Review OF
Reviews, he quotes an eminent American as
remarking upon his return from France
that if the war had come fifteen years later
'sthe United States could not have built her
environments nor sent arms to her men
abroad without importing timber either from
the Pacific Coast from foreign country, IN
either case at Vast expense both of money
and of time" From another and hlghly I'M
portant point of view comes the statement OF
mill owners in the Pacific Northwest that
supplies will last from only thirty to forty
years more "a period in the life OF nation
equal to less than one year in the career OF
a spend-thrift youth Within those thirty
or forty years the ever-lengthenlng haul OF
timber from the Far West will add enor-
mously to the costs Of construction and al
lied industries. 1t is estimated that already
the city of Chicago is paying as much as
twenty-five million dollars annually IN add
tional freight rates of this kind AT Con-
gressional hearing in Washington lew
months ago it was the unanimous testimony
of lumbermen and foresters from every re-
gion that "we are approaching tlmoer
shortage and that whatever measures or re-
lief are possible must be taken promptly.
Indeed sit is already too late to ward OH
completely the famine into whose shadow we
have entered"
Georgia's concern in this national prob
lem is far-reaching and vital. Within less
than a decade, authorities say, the South
Atlantic and Gulf States, whence the country
has been receiving large part or It's pulld-
ing lumber and structural timbers, Will pro-
duce less than they themselves consume. The
pine forests of this region have decreased
from six hundred and fifty billion board
feet to about one hundred and thlrty-n1ne
billion. Both as an agricultural common
wealth and as potential empire or industry
Georgia has urgent reason to stay her own
trend toward forest depletion and to encour-
age her neighbors to do likewise. For not
only is her timber supply involved, but also
her soil and her water power. Stripped OF
forests, she will have lost natures cnlet
safeguard against floods, and the Washing
away of fertility, and the coming OF climatic
extremes. and the eventual loss of the re-
sources on which depend hydro-electrlc de-
velopment with all that it betides to indus
trial power and prosperity. No State, indeed,
has more bound up in the cause OF torest
conservation.
The Georgia Forestry Committee and its
co-workers should have the heart-whole sup
port of thinking citizens in the movement 10
protect our remaining timberlands against
fire and waste and to provide. as far as is
feasible, for the reforestation OF denudeo
areas Private interests, including the own
ers Of timber and of water-power sites, as
we'll as farmers, should lend particularly
earnest aid because the very existence OF
their industries is at stake. Public interests
also are in the balance, for if forest destruc-
ton goes on unchecked no mans business
can escape the i'll consequence and no prov
ince of the common veal but will pay the
cost. The State, therefore, should cooperate
literally, both with cumberland owners anc
with the Federal Government in we'll advised
efforts IT, save and conserve realm or nat
ural treasure on which so much of economic
and of human good depends.