374 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



The wide utilization of the less rare tropical timbers will be slow in 

 coming, but a start has been made and both the Philippines and Borneo 

 have been successful in placing their "ordinary timbers" on outside 

 markets. British North Borneo has been exporting construction tim- 

 bers as well as the rare hardwoods ever since 1881, and just prior to 

 the war was achieving considerable success in placing the softer but 

 well-colored woods on markets in the United Kingdom and Australia. 

 In 1913 the Government of British North Borneo decided that their 

 forest resource was an asset which merited attention, and early in 

 191 5 a definite program of forest exploration was inaugurated. By 

 the end of that year the work had proceeded far enough to indicate 

 that the timber supplies of the State were one of its principal assets, 

 and in 1916 the Forestry Department was definitely organized as a 

 permanent government institution and the work of exploring and 

 classifying the timbered areas of the State and administering the de- 

 velopment of the resource entrusted to it. 



North Borneo lies directly south of the Philippine Archipelago and 

 at no great distance from the islands of Mindanao and Palawan. As 

 is to be expected from its geographical location, the forest is very sim- 

 ilar in character to that of the Philippines, and although some species, 

 such as Billian (Busideroxylon zzvageri) and Borneo camphor (Dryo- 

 balanops spp.), are found in abundance in Borneo, but only rarely or 

 not at all in the Philippines, the bulk of the important species are 

 closely related to or identical with those of the Philippines. This for- 

 tunate circumstance has enabled reconnaissance work in Borneo to 

 proceed with a rapidity and accuracy which would not have been 

 possible had not the experience and data gathered in the Philippines 

 been available as a basis to start from. 



As the work in Borneo has so recently started, the forest staff is 

 small, consisting of two American foresters and three trained Philip- 

 pine rangers. Provision has been made for the enlargement of the 

 ■staff, but as yet it has been impossible to obtain the men. The area of 

 the State of North Borneo is approximately 31,000 square miles and 

 the total forested area is at present estimated to be 19,000,000 acres, 

 -of which probably 13,000,000 acres carry commercial forest. With 

 a forest area as vast as this to deal with, it was clearly impossible to 

 aim at any accurate estimation or classification of the timbered area as 

 a whole. It was therefore decided to run intensive surveys at points 

 where the forest was accessible from harbors or navigable rivers, and 

 where the timber seemed to be at least as good as the average. It was 

 hoped that work such as this would lead immediately to the location 



