IMPORTED TIMBER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1032, 24 July 1930, Page 7

IMPORTED TIMBER

RISKS FROM BORER QUESTION ASKED IN HOUSE THE SUN’S Parliamentary Reporter WELLINGTON, Wednesday. Tho menace to New Zealand forests through the importation of pestaffected timber was tho subject of an urgent question in the House of Representatives today by Mr. W. E. Barnard (Labour —Napier), who asked the Minister of Customs, the Hon. G. W. Forbes, whether the Government could not take immediate steps to prohibit tho further importation of borerinfested or borer-affected timbers. It was reported, he said, that an appreciable quantity of Pacific Coast timber landed at Napier on July 20 from the Union Company’s Waihemo was very badly affected by borer. As 71 per cent, of New Zealand’s forest and timber pests had been introduced from abroad, grave concern was felt, and had been expressed by the Government entomologist and experts of the State Forest Service for the future of the Dominion’s remaining indigenous forests and huge areas of plantations if no measures were taken to check tho unrestricted introduction of further wood and forest pests. Tho Minister said that he had received from Mr. Barnard a sample of the wood affected by the borer, and he had forwarded it to the Forestry Department for report. On receipt of the report he would decide what action should be taken. No doubt steps would bo taken if it were found that borer was present in the wood.