Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star THURSDAY, JULY 15th, 1920. FORESTRY DEVELOPMENT

Hokitika Guardian, 15 July 1920, Page 2

Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star THURSDAY, JULY 15th, 1920. FORESTRY DEVELOPMENT

In the course of a paper read before tile Agriculture Conference at Wellington last week, Captain M. Ellis, the regent ly appointed Director of Forestry said ip tlie supply of future timber requirements it fyas qujte apparent that New Zealand must stand alone apd the problem of providing adequate timber supplies for this country must be solved within its boundaries, The immediate and future demands in Now Zealand were going to bo very much larger than they had ever been in the past. Considering fhp important developments that were taking pj;icg—and would take place in this country—and with, say, an increase of population to five millions in a generation, the timber consumption of workwood would in a few years be one thousand million feet per year. Any examination of the facts must lead to these conclusions : —Timber is and will be hi short supply throughout the world, and this Dominion is definitely thrown hack upon its own resources. Supplies from abroad are bound to dwindle rapidly in amount, and equally are bound to rise to a prohibitive price. It follows that the provident use and development of its own forest assets offers New Zealand its only means of averting the disastrous dislocation of inaustry and serious increase in'the cost of living which undoubtedly would result from a failure, or even from any serious, contraction of timber supplies. There i is no escape from the conclusion that this country, if it is to avert a ruinous check to its national development must place its forest resources in such order as will enable them a generation lienee to produce one thousand million feet of timber per annum, and thereafter produce continuing timber crops of increasing magnitude. It is upon the correct appreciation of these facts that the institution and maintenance of a stabilised national forest policy must largely depend. If the demand for timber as an indispensable material in connection with practically all forms of useful production is to be met, every potential and available resource must be utilised, and its use perpetuated; Happily the Dominion is now in a fair way to deal effectively with this vital national problem of timber supply Tlie Government is pledged to a definite policy and you have secured from die Government a definite declaration is to the future forest policy of the -mmtry. During the 1918 session if Parliament there was passed, legislation which empowered the Government 1 o select certain indigenous forest areas irovisionally as State forests, which ireas are to he scientifically managed or the production of continuous timber rops. Under the authority of this Act . here has been up to date allocated 1,367,000 acres, and it is tn be hoped ( hat within a few more months there (dll have been segregated for permanent niational forests a. total aggregate of 5,118,000 acres. This is indeed < , splendid beginning, and one that au 1 ;urs well for the future. The Com- ‘ ljiissioner of State Forests has offi- c ially intimated that the policy of the ' iovernment with reference to the indi- t

genous forests is to install nil active and practical scheme of forest management, and an energetic policy with regard to State afforestation. This policy .is! just in ®>timo to save for present and future generations the perpetuated use of the great public forest resources. Largely as tlu* case for a national forest policy is based upon the requirements of timber supply, there are other considerations, (vital in themselves, which make suoH a policy essential. The nation has a thlreefoH interest in forestry which may be specified as follows:—(1) 'l'll ■ assurance of timber supplies; (2) the influence of forest cover on water conditions, soil fertility, climatic conditions and public health; (31 the utilisation of all land areas to the best advantage. It is not more true that forests ,oiusi be conserved in order to produce adequate timber supplies, than that they are essential in order that the agricultural lands of the Dominion may he maintained at the highest point of wolfwatered fertility, and as a means • f limiting the impoverishment of fertile lands by erosion anrl the. unchecked action of flood waters. In this com paw I need hardly enlarge upon the ;nci dental results of forest devastation, in impairing water conservation! and occasioning a disastrous deterioration :>f land surfaces, not only oil mountain slopes where, in many cases the soil can only be maintained under forest cover, but in fertile low-lying areas which aro needlessly exposed to flood action by-the destruction of forest at the higher altitudes.