News and Notes 543 



Merchantable is used for car-sills where select should be used; it 

 is not satisfactory and the railroad goes back to Pitch pine or teak 

 at twice the price. On the other hand, one mine of one hundred on 

 the Rand uses Douglas fir and finds it satisfactory; no one finds 

 it out and conducts a systematic campaign to educate the other 

 mine managers. No one does these things because there is no one 

 in South Africa whose business it is to do so. So long as timber is 

 used, the timber merchants are secure. The money which might 

 have gone to removing these prejudices and developing the market 

 has gone to the merchants who charge four times as much profit 

 on Douglas fir in South Africa as on Swedish timber. The profit 

 on wholesaling Douglas fir in South Africa is greater than the total 

 f. o. b. price in British Columbia. 



The establishing of regular sailings, even of small vessels, once 

 in two months between British Colimibia and South African ports 

 wotdd greatly increase the exports of Douglas fir. The purchase 

 of cargoes, with accompanying heavy investment, the holding of 

 cargoes in stock, with interest charges accumulating and stock 

 deteriorating, one year or more, would no longer be necessary. 

 The importations would no longer be restricted to five or six 

 merchants for the whole of South Africa. All persons engaged in 

 the trade would import and more energy would be shown in 

 pushing the sale of the timber. 



The elements of a great and successful market campaign exist in 

 South Africa. Douglas fir is delivered to South Africa cheaper than 

 any other timber. 



About $5,000,000 worth of timber is now imported yearly for 

 general building and construction purposes alone. The country is 

 yet undeveloped. Even greater quantities of building and con- 

 struction timber will be required in the future. Every producer 

 Douglas fir knows it is a construction timber, then why does 

 Douglas fir represent only 7 per cent of the imports of building 

 timber to South Africa? Because no one in South Africa is selling 

 Douglas fir, and the moment it a. -ives in the country it is robbed 

 of its one greatest advantage, its cheapness. 



It is only necessary that the problem be treated on broad lines. 

 The timber industry, if organized, is wealthy enough and strong 

 enough to market limiber in the same manner as gasoline, tobacco, 

 or steel products are marketed. The cost of doing this in South 

 Africa will be very small, and when it is done the exports will leap 

 from insignificance to importance. 



The lumber cut of the nation by species, with the values of the 

 woods per thousand at 1915 prices is shown by a Forest Service 

 report just announced. The table gives the incomplete reported 

 cut of each principal species and the probable total cut of each 

 included in the computed total production of lumber of all kinds, 

 37,013,294,000 board feet, which was announced the last of 

 April. ^ 



