ORGANISATION OF THE CHINESE FOREST SERVICE. 1 27 



timber lands— not in any way prohibiting their use or unduly 

 restricting the profit which may be obtained therefrom for the 

 present generation of Chinese. We certainly would not wish to 

 create national forest " reserves," in the sense that " reserve " 

 means the locking up of such resources for the benefit of future 

 generations. The forester does not believe in prohibition of use, 

 but in wise conservative utilisation so that the forest resources 

 may be made to yield the greatest possible benefit to the present 

 inhabitants of the country, but without decreasing their 

 productive capacity or their potential benefits to the generations 

 to come. The forester never forgets that the people come first ; 

 that forestry is not an end in itself, but a means, although a very 

 essential means, to increasing the welfare of the people at large. 

 This thought is expressed admirably in a book recently issued 

 by Mr Pinchot, former Chief of the United States Forest 

 Service, and the man to whom more than to any other America 

 owes its present forest policy. In the opening paragraph he 

 asks frankly, " What is forestry?" and he answers as follows : — 



" Forestry is the knowledge of the forest. In particular, 

 it is the art of handling the forest so that it will render 

 whatever service is required of it without being impoverished 

 or destroyed. For example, a forest may be handled so 

 as to produce saw logs, telegraph poles, barrel hoops, fire- 

 wood, tan-bark, or turpentine. The main purpose of its 

 treatment may be to prevent the washing of soil, to regulate 

 the flow of streams, to support cattle or sheep, or it may be 

 handled so as to supply a wide range and combination of 

 uses. Forestry is the art of producing frotn t/ie forest lahatever 

 it can yield for the service of man ^ 



While, as I have said above, speaking in general terms forestry 

 in China will be popularly judged by our success or lack of 

 success in reforestation, the management of existing forest areas 

 (which possess a value all the greater by reason of their scarcity) 

 is too important to be neglected, and the Forest Service anxiously 

 longs for the day when such timber lands can be put under 

 technical administration. 



The part that the proposed Division of Co-operation will 

 undoubtedly play in the future is very large. As soon as we 

 are in a position to give definite advice as to all important 

 details of reforestation on a large scale (and we in the Forest 



