PROGRESS OF FORESTRY.

Taranaki Daily News, 18 October 1919, Page 5

PROGRESS OF FORESTRY.

DESTRUCTIVE POLK* ARRESTED.

By Telegraph.—Press Association. \ Wellington, Last Night. At the annual meeting of the New Zealand Forestry League, the President. sir ■ James Wilson, said the League wight be congratulated on the progress forestry had made during the past year U was difficult to change a destructive policy into a constructive one, but it seemed to him that the destructive polity had been arrested. He emphasised that none, of the remaining forests should' be sacrificed if the land was. more suitable for timber growing than settlement. b

Sir Francis Bell, in commending members for their valuable, and unselfish labor on behalf of our forests, assured them that so long us he retained office he would try to gather under the control of the Department of I'orests as much land as lie ,;ould get hold of. In view of the fact that at this moment every acre of land v:ipable of settlement mis required for our soldier settlers, this would mean constant effort on his part.

ilio Minister of Lands sp.id it was . gratifying to see the sinus of life Were not dying out in the forestry League. He expressed the opinion that the creation of a separate Forestry Department was a st.ep in .the right direction. Mr John Deans (Canterbury), in an: address on forest regeneration, emphasised the great good that could be accomplished in this direction in planting poorer and waste lands with varitons species of pine, particularly pinus iimgui--.

Mr W. J. Butler remarked that the question of using our forests to the beat advantage had not been sufficiently eonsidered from an industrial and commercial point of view.

In the evening Mr J. Orchiton read a paper in which he advocated that treeplanting should be encouraged by Government subsidies or the remission of rates and taxes on land so planted until the trees reached a reproductive stage.

The following officers were elected:— President. Sir James Wilson; hon. teeretary, Mr F. W. Furkert; hon. treasurer, Mr A. Leigh Hunt; members of the council, General Sir Andrew Russell, the Rev. J, 11. Sinimonds, Dr. Hay, Messrs. B. Chambers. T. F. Chessman, G. M. Thomson. F. W. Furkert, W. J. Birch, W. Ferguson, and James Hay,