Little Acorns

Timber consumption in this country is more than four times as great as the annual growth. The Senate Committee on Reforestation*, after completing a trip through timberlands of the Southern States, resumed investigations in Washington. A few facts indicate the seriousness of the situation:

P: The combined lumber cut of Maine, New York and Pennsylvania, each of which at some time led the country in production, is now not enough to supply the needs of Pennsylvania alone.

P: A large part of the lumber used in the East is shipped from Oregon, the leading timber State at present. (Senator McNary, Chairman of the Committee, comes from Oregon.)

P: There are 213,000,000 acres of cut over, burned and devastated lands in the United States. Of this area only about 10,000,000 acres--or less than 5%--are being adequately cared for.

P: In the past twelve years 70,000,000 acres of this waste forest land have been created. The entire forest area in the United States is only about 463,000,000 acres.

How to encourage reforestation is the problem which the Committee must solve. Two methods are being used at present: Government purchase and government aid. Government purchase is being carried out by the National Forest Reservation Commission at an expenditure of about $1,000,000 a year. The amount of land that can be purchased is relatively small.

The work of Federal aid is now costing about $400,000 a year. Chief Forester W. B. Greeley told the Committee that the expenditure should be increased to $1,000,000 and later to $2,500,000. Colonel Greeley believes that fire protection is 75% of the reforestation problem. The remainder is taxation relief.

The question of tax relief rests with the states. Except where special forest tax laws are in effect it is seldom profitable to grow timber, because the return comes only once in 30 to 50 years, and is not commensurate with taxes paid in the meantime. The question is whether the government should attempt to force favorable legislation from the states by refusing Federal financial cooperation to states which do not make forestry profitable. Senator McNary favors this form of procedure. Colonel Greeley, however, is opposed, believing that it is of primary importance to get young forests growing everywhere without waiting for favorable state action.

*McNary, Harrison, Couzens, Fletcher and Moses (who is now abroad).