FOREST PROBLEMS IN THE PHILIPPINES 



By BARRINGTON MOORE, M,F„ United States Forest Service 



I INTRODUCTION 



IN THE present movement for con- 

 serving our natural resources, too 

 little attention has been paid to 

 those of our most important possession, 

 the Philippine Islands. 



In the short space of this article, an 

 attempt will be made to give some idea 

 of the forest conditions, the problems 

 which confront the forestry bureau of 

 the islands, and what has been done 

 and is being done to solve these prob- 

 lems. 



II THE FOREST 



Up till very recently the conception 

 of the Philippine forests held not only 

 popularly, but by the better-informed 

 people of the islands, was an altogether 

 erroneous one. The belief was that 

 they were made up almost entirely of 

 a large number of different species of 

 trees, most of which would yield a 

 beautiful, hard, heavy wood, of great 

 value in furniture making or cabinet 

 work. This idea probably came from 

 the fact that under Spanish occupation 

 such woods were naturally enough the 

 first, and practically only, ones to be 

 used, and that wood dealers attempted 

 to make the public believe that such 

 woods were the regular product of the 

 Philippine forests. This misconception 

 has done considerable harm to the rep- 

 utation of these forests, in that when 

 people begin to find out that such valu- 

 able woods are really rather scarce, they 

 think that the wealth of the forests has 

 been greatly overrated and that they 

 are not really worth anything at all. 

 The fact is that the forests are mostly 

 made up of soft woods of the Diptero- 

 carp family, the proportion being 



seventy-five per cent Dipterocarp to 

 only twenty-five per cent hardwoods. 

 AUhough not as valuable as hardwoods, 

 these Dipterocarp are far easier to 

 utilize and a good deal more useful on 

 the whole. Though generally known 

 as softwoods, they vary a great deal 

 in hardness, from Giujo (Shorea 

 Guiso), which is somewhat harder than 

 our Elms, to the Lavans, which are 

 about as soft as our Tulip or Yellow 

 Poplar (Liriodendron Tulipfera). On 

 account of their abundance and the ease 

 with which they can be worked, both 

 in logging and sawing, they are destined 

 to form the bulk of the lumber supply 

 of the Philippines for ordinary con- 

 struction purposes. They will be to the 

 Philippines what the Conifers are to 

 the I'nited States. Not only should 

 they form the bulk of the lumber of 

 the Philippines, but under proper man- 

 agement and utilization, they should be 

 able to supply the lumber markets of 

 most of the far East. 



For an idea of these forests, a brief 

 description of the one on Northern 

 Negros, in which the Insular Lumber 

 Company have a concession, will be 

 given. This forest is fairly typical of 

 the Dipterocarp forests of the islands, 

 though perhaps the moisture conditions 

 are a little more favorable, on account 

 of the absence of a distinct dry season 

 such as is found in other parts of the 

 islands, and the stand per acre some- 

 what heavier than the general run. Of 

 the trees of over twelve inches in diam- 

 eter at breast height, ninety per cent are 

 Dipterocarps of six species. The two 

 commonest and most important, fonn- 

 ino- the bulk of the forest on the flats 

 and lower slopes, are Red Lavan 

 ( Shorea species, will probably be called 

 Evcretti) and Almon Lavan (Shorea 



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