FORESTRY CRITICISM

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 276, 11 February 1928, Page 10

FORESTRY CRITICISM

DUNEDIN MAN’S VIEWS “AMEND THE COMPANIES ACT” “Cutting rights over a large area of good timber country may be had per acre for a fraction of the cost of a New Zealand Perpetual Forest bond. This refers to good marketable timber, not pinus insignis.” YyRITING from Dunedin “W.F.S.” has a number of things to say about the articles on New Zealand Perpetual Forests published in The Sun. He says: “Your action is courageous and most commendable and I am sure will be appreciated by the public. Mr. Coates may realise the urgency of making inquiries re the cost of the sale of bonds, the price of land purchased, and its suitability for growing trees. We do know that there was a great deal of misrepresentation by share-pushers in connection with the Kawarau scheme and repetition of that sort must prejudice outsiders against New Zealand. “There is room for amendment of the Companies Act. A prospectus and advertisements in connection with it should be restricted to bare facts while exaggerated and misleading statements should be forbidden, and it is most objectionable and, I thought, illegal for directors of a company to accept commissions from the company of which they are directors. “Therein 1 may be wrong. If so, the Companies Act requires amending. There are many people in New Zealand and elsewhere who have not the means or opportunity of investigating for themselves such propositions. They listen to the roseate story of the ‘push salesman,’ who is mostly con cerned in making his commission. He has no real knowledge of the subject and is not particular as to statements. Several visited my house one evening and painted a beautiful word picture concerning this scheme of afforestation. The suggestion that these plantations will be worth £SOO an acre 20 years hence appears to me a positive exaggeration. “About a year ago I travelled one hundred miles through timber country on the West Coast. There are thousands of acres of virgin bush beyond that from the Franz Joseph Glacier round the Sounds to the Longwood Ranges in Southland. I don’t profess to know a great deal re the North Island timber country, but I understand that cutting rights over a large area of good timber country may be had per acre, for a fraction of the cost of a New Zealand Perpetual Forest bond. This refers to good marketable timber, not pinus insignis. PINE AS BUILDING MATERIAL “For building purposes concrete is playing havoc with the timber trade and many mills are closed down. Anyway, one cannot seriously consider pinus insignis for building purposes nor would a builder or architect risk any young timber of twenty years’ growth in a dwelling-house. Then, it is suggested that the timber may be suitable for pulping. The New Zealand Government was, and I assume is still prepared to give a concession over some thousands of acres to any company or individual prepared to put a pulping plant up. An effort to form a company to take advantage of the Government offer was made a few years ago by several well-known Christchurch gentlemen, but the necessary capital was not available. Some of the timber was sent to Norway and pulped and the prospectuses issued were printed on the paper obtained from this pulp. The area is alongside a railway and water is obtainable for hydro-electric power, so there is plenty of suitable timber available now for paper pulp and I think it is quite likely that before the lapse of twenty years some enterprising Arm will have erected a pulping plant in New Zealand or Australia that will be capable of supplying the whole of our requirements. “In the meantime wood pulp is shipped from Canada to New Zealand in bulk. Then it must be borne in mind that the New Zealand Government has for many years past employed prison and other labour in planting waste lands of New Zealand. Some millions of trees are flourishing in the Rotorua district. The leading coal mines have plantations of timber suitable for their purposes. I do not know the land that has been planted by New Zealand Perpetual Forests, and a great deal will depend on its suitability for timber growing. Some districts will produce good timber while other land only a stunted imitation.”