The Hokitika Guardian FRIDAY, JANUARY 6th, 1922. AFFORESTATION IN WESTLAND.

Hokitika Guardian, 6 January 1922, Page 2

The Hokitika Guardian FRIDAY, JANUARY 6th, 1922. AFFORESTATION IN WESTLAND.

It is to be hope<l that the expensive State Forest Service will begin to justify itself with works in Westland during the year now entered on. Westland is the natural home of the forest, and where better could 1 the Department begin its afforestatoion and reafEorestation work. Yesterday a passsing reference was made to the need for matching the operations of the Department as affecting the timber industry which is of such importance to this district. The matter is mentioned again to-day as one of prime importance. Unfortunately Westland appears to be a lone voice, crying in the wilderness and it is not likely to receive much outside assistance. Whatever assistance it can gain will be won off its own bat, as it were. If, therefore, the district is to gain anything from the Forestry' Department it will require to agitate for it. In other parts of the Dominion on arid plains and sea boaches apparently for

choice the Forestry Department is attempting experimental tree-grow-ing. It is one of the mysteries why the Department does not launch out in country like Westland, where the forest grows so luxuriaently even unattended. This is the natural home

for the forest, the soil and weather conditions predetermining the future of the forest. If the Government, as part of the policy, is bent on reafforestation, then Westland has an undeniable claim as a centre, not for experimental growth, for nature has determined that, but for a genuine plantation, or rather series of plantations, on the thousands of acres of Crown Lands which stretch along the Coast. In the first flourish of the policy, afforesta-

tion had a place, and there was the

suggestion that (irons would be set i apart in Westland for the purpose: It is high time now a move was mod? :•

secure this practical advance in securing future supplies of timber for the coming generation. This is the more . practical way than conserving indefinii teliy the millions of feet of timber

which could be milled to advantage just now but which it appears is to be the policy to hold the commodity in reserve. Naturally, if the Director is to give shape to his policy, he should advance this matter himself, but seeing the Departmental remissness, the people themselves should take up the agitation. If the people of this day arc to get the benefit of nature’s bounty in the matter of standing timber, reafforestation on the already cleared spaces should go ahead. Some years are required to bring a plantation to profit, and the time being wasted now by talk instead of action, is time lost. Afforestation is of great importance for the future. It has been promised to be undertaken on the Hau Hau plateau and also between the Hokitika and Totara rivers. But the promises are not being fulfilled. Last year the Depart spent £BO,OOO for a revenue of £20,000 The country cannot afford this excessive outgoing unless reproductive work is carried out by the expenditure. In an afforestation movement there would be n plantation growing more valuable every year, till it came to maturity when it would be a valuable crop indeed. On the waste lands of Westland, many thousands of acres could 1)© so utilised—giving Westland a permanent forest and the Dominion an indispensible asset. It is necessary to get busy now.