55 



stitutes bear this additional charge, when added to the cost of logging, 

 milling, and transportation? Or will substitutes be found more economi- 

 cal and practical than the enterprise of timber production to which the 

 term forestry is given? 



In general, it may be said that the use of substitutes for wood is 

 certain to increase very rapidly in the next two or three decades, due to 

 the steady advance to be expected in the cost of wood of all kinds, but 

 that ultimately wood can be grown and placed on the market at costs 

 which for many purposes should easily restore its economic supremacy 

 and use. Such future use of wood and its extent will be limited only 

 by the quantities capable of being produced. Wood production, or for- 

 estry, Vv'ill be one of the safest forms of industry and of investment. 



Meanwhile, the prospects in the near future for reduction in the 

 cost of living are not bright, so far as they are affected by the supply and 

 cost of wood. The extent to which industry will be disrupted and costs 

 increased by the withdrawal of wood as a raw material and the substi- 

 tution of other products, mineral, vegetable, or animal, may be roughly 

 approximated by an analysis of the economic position which wood now 

 occupies in Illinois industry. 



The Use of Wood in Manufacturing Industries 



Of the four major groups of industry, namely, manufacturing, agri- 

 culture, transportation, and mining, the first, or manufacturing, uses most 

 of its required wood-supply in the form of lumber, while the consump- 

 tion by the other three groups requires a large proportion of wood in the 

 form of round products, such as cordwood, posts, ties, and timbers. 



Thus 58.37 per cent of the total lumber requirements of the state 

 are absorbed by the wood-using manufacturing industries, or a total of 

 1,373,900,000 board feet in 1920, as against 41.63 per cent for lumber 

 required in construction. 



A complete study of the consumption of wood in the wood-using 

 industries, which would mean a revision of the bulletin on "Wood-using 

 Industries of Illinois"* (giving data for 1909 and published in 1910) 

 was not attempted. Instead, the total consumption of wood in all forms 

 was studied for certain important wood-using industries and for agri- 

 culture, mining, and rail transportation. 



• By Roger E. Simmons. Statistician in Forest Products. U. S. Forest Service, 

 under direction of J. C. Blair, Chief. Dept. Hort., Univ. 111., and H. S. Sackett, Chief, 

 Office of Wood Utilization, U. S. Forest Service. 



