CHINA'S FOREST LAWS 

 By Forsythe Sherfesee' 



On January 15, 1916, the Chinese Forest Service was for- 

 mally inaugurated as an annex to the Ministry of Agriculture 

 and Commerce. In the history of forestry this date will 

 be taken as marking the first real beginning of modern 

 forestry in China. It is true that, as wiU be shown, there 

 had been for several years certain efforts in the cause of 

 reforestation; some of them instigated by private indi- 

 viduals, some by educational organizations or institutions, 

 some by the provinces and some by the Central Govern- 

 ment at Peking, and the cimiulative effect of these projects 

 was of undoubted importance; but the significance of the move- 

 ment which was launched in January of this year lies in the fact 

 that it marks the decision of the Central Chinese Government 

 definitely to adopt an active, extensive policy of reforestation and 

 of forest protection and management, and at least its inten- 

 tion to proceed along the line of a definite scientific policy in 

 accomplishing certain clearly defined ends. It means that here- 

 after it is intended that all efforts and individual projects shall 

 be shaped in accordance with a uniform policy so far as it is within 

 the power or influence of the Central Government to do ; and, best 

 of all, that an effort is being made to gather together a personnel 

 and to establish an organization which will put accomplishment 

 within the realm of practicability. 



Soon after the Republic of China was organized there was 

 created a Ministry called "The Ministry of Agriculture and 

 Forestry" and at the same time there was brought into existence 

 a so-called Department of Forestry in the Ministry. This was in 

 August of 1912. The Department lasted two years, but it seems 

 to have merely existed without a definite, clearly defined policy, 

 a driving force or correlation of efforts. A nursery had been 

 established in a portion of the spacious grounds of the Temple of 

 Heaven in the southern city of Peking; also an office called the 

 "Bureau of Forestry for ICirin Province" (Kirin being one of the 

 three Manchurian provinces) had been established with head- 

 quarters at the City of Kirin, the chief of the bureau reporting to 



1 Adviser in Forestry, Chinese Government. 

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