HARDWOOD RECORD 



Philippine Public Forests and Possibilities 

 For Their Exploitation. 



The Bureau of Forestry of the Philippines 

 has recently issued a report from Manila, 

 which tells exactly what lumbermen looking 

 for foreign timber propositions need to know. 

 It is therefore excerpted and reproduced here- 

 with. It covers the ground briefly and fully, 

 and points out all the problems likely to 

 arise in tackling timber enterprise in the 

 Philippines, as well as relates the experience 

 of companies already operating there. 



Although the future prosperity of the 

 Philippine Islands depends mainly on their 

 agricultural development, yet it is generally 

 recognized that the proper exploitation of 

 the extensive Philippine forests will add ex- 

 ceedingly to the future prosperity and also 

 aid greatly in agricultural development. 



More than one-half of the land area of 

 120,000 square miles in the islands is covered 

 with tree growth. Of the 60,000 square miles 

 of forest, 40,000 square miles are in the more 

 thinly settled islands of Mindoro, Samar, 

 Palawan and Mindanao. 



It must be admitted, however, that large 

 parts of this timbered area can not be con- 

 sidered commercial forest by lumbermen. 

 Scattered stands of small unmerchantable 

 trees and inaccessible mountain forests cover 

 considerable areas. Estimating conserva- 

 tively, there are 25,000 square miles, or 

 16,000,000 acres, of timber which can and 

 will be exploited on a reasonably large scale. 

 An average yield of 2,.500 board feet of 

 merchantable timber per acre on this area is 

 a consenative estimate, giving a total supply 

 of 40,000,000,000 board feet. The total 

 annual cut in the islands is now less than 

 50,000,000 feet or only about one-eighth of 

 one per cent of the probable supply. This 

 cut is an insignificant item of the annual 

 growth in these forests. The forests under 

 conservative treatment should furnish an 

 annual supply of at least 400,000,000 feet of 

 mature timber and be improved by so doing. 



The timbers in the islands include a great 

 variety, ranging from pine and calantas, or 

 soft tropical cedar, to the extremely heavy 

 and hard dungon and mancono. In general, 

 Philippine woods are hard and heavy, yet 

 there are not lacking abundant supplies of 

 light and strong construction timbers which 

 can well be substituted for the white pine, 

 Oregon pine, and California redwood, which 

 are imported. Lauan is a fairly soft, strong 

 wood and can well take the place of Oregon 

 pine and California redwood. Apitong, 

 harder, heavier, and stronger than lauan, is 

 equal to Oregon pine and longleaf pine for 

 general construction. Lauan and apitong and 

 the other species of the same family. Dip- 

 tcrocarpacew, are not only the most abundant 

 timber occurring in the archipelago but they 

 rirc very large trees. Timber up to ninety 

 li.f in length can be secured from them. 



They are also excellent finishing woods, equal 

 to most American woods used for interior 

 finish. 



Some of the finest cabinet woods in the 

 world are found in the Philippines. Ebony, 

 aele, narra, camagou and tindalo give the 

 greatest choice in beautiful color and grain. 

 These and others would make superior substi- 

 tutes for the American cabinet woods which 

 are so rapidly disappearing. For cherry and 

 mahogany, narra, tanguile, balacbacan, 

 calantas and lumbayao, though dififering 

 somewhat in grain and hardness, can be used; 

 for black walnut, acle and banuyo can be 

 used; and so on, every American furniture 

 wood having numerous Philippine substitutes. 

 Valuable woods such as ebony, camagon and 

 tindalo have no counterparts in the United 

 States. 



At present Philippine lumber is produced 

 almost exclusively for the local demands. In 

 the fiscal year 1904-05 the islands used about 

 75,000,000 board feet of lumber, of which 

 they produced about 40,000,000 feet. The 

 r( niainder was imported from the Pacific 

 coast. It seems anomalous that a country so 

 rich in timber should not produce more than 

 one-half of the supply necessary for its own 

 people. The reasons are that lumbering is 

 generally on such a small scale and with such 

 inefiicient methods, and facilities for trans- 

 portation of timber in the islands at present 

 so poor, that Oregon pine is sold in Manila 

 and other large cities cheaper than most 

 native lumber. 



Conditions demand the development of a 

 modern lumber industry and the installation 

 of large sawmills and suitable transportation 

 facilities so that Philippine lumber can domi- 

 nate in the Philippine Islands and penetrate 

 to foreign markets. Large operations, well 

 capitalized and efficiently managed, are neces- 

 sary if the Philippine people are to receive 

 a proper economic benefit from the possession 

 of their valuable forests. 



The company desiring to establish a large 

 lumbering operation in the Philippines can 

 rot study too carefully the factors governing 

 the lumber industry here. These factors are 

 the character of the forests, the accessibility 

 of the timber, transportation facilities, labor 

 conditions, stumpage prices, and market con- 

 ditions, which are herewith discussed. 



A lumberman desiring to operate on a 

 large scale demands in a commercial forest 

 accessibility, comparatively few species per 

 acre — most of which are merchantable, and 

 enough merchantable timber per acre to per- 

 mit the use of modern logging methods. 

 Large areas of Philippine forest, althongh 

 containing valuable timber, fail to answer 

 these requirements. 



In Benguet and neighboring provinces at 

 an altitude of more than 2,000 feet are the 

 open pine forests. Along the coasts, espe- 



cially at the mouths of the rivers, are exten- 

 sive ^alt-water or tidal swamps known as 

 "manglares," from which come firewood, tan- 

 bark and dyebark. The low coast flat is 

 another forest type, characterized by scat- 

 tered trees of ipil and a few other valuable 

 species. The tangled forests of the deltas 

 and river bottoms present the greatest variety 

 in species but are not satisfactory for exten- 

 sive lumbering. Finally, there is the exten- 

 sive hill or upland type of forest which is 

 the most suitable for lumbering operations. 



On rocky, exposed and thin-soiled uplands 

 the forest is thinner and is characterized by 

 a smaller proportion of commercial species. 

 Here the most valuable trees are found scat- 

 tered through a stand composed largely of 

 small, unmerchantable trees, and other type 

 of upland forest grows on the better, deeper 

 soils. Here is generally found a fairly dense 

 stand of large trees, principally members of 

 one family, Dipterocarpacew. The best ex- 

 ample of this type is the forest in northern 

 Negros where a lumber company is now oper- 

 ating. Here these woods niake up a stand 

 of 32,000 feet board measure of merchantable 

 timber per acre. This type of forest nat- 

 urally answers best the requirements of mod- 

 ern logging, and upon it will largely depend 

 the development of an extensive lumber in- 

 dustry. Both classes of hill forests are 

 found Ihroughout the islands. 



The Bureau of Forestry is gradually loca- 

 ting and roughly mapping the best commercial 

 forests of all these tj-pes. The information 

 thus collected is available to all interested 

 parties. 



The commercial forests are found either 

 along the coast where the timber can be 

 skidded directly to the beach and loaded in 

 suitable harbors, along navigable and float- 

 able rivers where it is skidded directly to the 

 rivers and floated or rafted down them, or 

 at some distance inland so far from deep 

 water that short railroads are advisable or 

 necessary. As long as timber remains close 

 to the beach and large rivers, logging is easy 

 and cheap, requiring but little capital. In 

 such forests there are a large number of 

 operators, cutting small quantities of timber. 

 But these forests are being fast destroyed 

 by the farm.er. Lumbering in the future will 

 be in the extensive forests some distance 

 from the coast, where carabao will not serve 

 for hauling. 



The difficulties and expense in transporting 

 lumber to the markets are great. A lumber- 

 man who does not own his own boats is 

 handicapped. Few of the interisland steam- 

 ers are adapted for carrying lumber, and 

 freight rates are high and sometimes prohibi- 

 tive. From the island of Palawan to Manila, 

 a distance of about 300 miles, the freight 

 rate for logs is about $30, gold, per 1,000 

 feet board measure. Such rates arc mani 



