The Daily Alaska empire., 1934-03-26
A BILL OF SOME MOMENT.

1ast stnonth there was introduced in the Senate bill bv Senator Dill Washington which, if passed, would more than double Alaska's present population m an incredibly short time, add another year-rouno industry give employment to thousands and put to use valuable natural resource that has been wasting for many years. The bill Senate NO 2,i9z' reads follows:
 Be It Enacted, etc, That the importation
 of all pulpwood wood pulp or other wood
 susceptible of being used in the manufacture
 of paper, is hereby prohibited
 Sec 9 The provisions of this act shall
 be deemed to be part of the Tariff Act
 of 1880.
 In a comprehensive statement made at the tiie the measure was introduced, Senator Dill truly oe picted the plight the American paper manufacturers have found themselves in a result of the impor- tatlons of foreign pulpwood and wood pulp lie listed the timber resources of the nauon rom which can be manufactured ample supply ot uaper for our needs. He urged favorable action on the bill to the end that declining industry mght be revived employment given American labor m It, and stable supply of newsprint made available to the countrys publishers
 He gave a faithful picture of the neglected timber resources of Alaska, saying
 In Alaska we have another magnificent
 stand of timber untouched and rotting in
 the forests In the forest reserves of Alaska
 alone-and remember this timber IS owned
 solely by the United States Government
 we have 20,000,000 acres Of forest lanos, ana
 conservative cruise shows that these re
 serves contain a stand of more than &C.,
 100000 900 feet of standing timber. It takes
 no account of the enormous forests on the
 Kuskokwim, the Panama, the Yukon, and
 other great valleys that are outside the
 forest reserves
 It has been said and it is believed to
 be true that in Alaska alone there is more
 standing timber today than in all the
 Scandinavian Peninsula. Yet we talk about
 the exhaustion of our timber resources
 wholly overlooking the fact that timber IS
 productive natural resources. We fail to
 observe that the State of Maine has been
 cutting timber for more than 2OO years,
 and many of the forests of the South have
 been cut over time and again
 Here in Alaska trained foresters estimate, in the past 20 years enough timber has gone to waste tc have supplied one-third of the nations newsprn; reouirements had it been used for that purpose ano TO reduction would have taken place in the supply available for future use Millions of dollars expended in Canada could have been kept at home, thousands cf American workmen given employment, American shipping benefited Alaska populated much more than at present had free entry not been allowed to foreign pulpwood and wood pulp.
 There has, also, been another waste that few people take into consideration. Some have boastee of timber conservation in Alaska. What we have and have had is the very antthesis of conservation If is and has been shameful waste. Senator Dll was not unaware of this fact. He pointed out tha "a highly important fact not sufficiently wloe known is that timber is crop and that It reacne maturity and should be harvested like any othe crop If neglected allowed to stand indefinitely it deterorates for the best commercial uses Fo this reason the United States in the last 20 year of free trade has suffered a double loss-phiions dollars sent abroad and own forests declinin in value from nonuse."
 In many sections of Aaskas National Fores decline from nonuse has reached a serious stage Generations of trees, permitted to mature, rot an fall to the ground have clogged the forests untl first class trees cannot be produced Even forester are hesitant to set figure in the loss to the Natio from that source. It grows worse every year 1t allowed to continue The only remedy is utilization on the basis of scientific forestry. If Senator Dill bill should pass and it probably wont, this remed would be promptly applied for Alaskas pupwoo resources would be in wide demand.