488 CONFERENCE ON NATURAL BEAUTY 



We can also learn from international conferences, provided they 

 concern the same problems. 



I am responsible, as the chairman has said, for the counterpart 

 of this conference in Great Britain. We first met in 1963. We are 

 meeting again next November. We cover the same ground, but 

 from a different angle. 



I am constantly being told by Americans that Britain is far ahead 

 in these matters. I think at best this is a half truth. And I would 

 like to say a word in support of what Dr. Grafts has said there are 

 many great Americans who have done so much to give your country 

 a lead in so many ways. In many of these activities it is the United 

 States that leads the world. For instance, in outdoor recreation 

 studies and facilities, in national and State parks and forests, in 

 multipurpose use, in soil conservation, in interpretive services, in 

 wayside facilities, and in the national network of wildlife refuges. 



I would add that this conference is another example of something 

 which has not and could not be repeated in any other country. 



On the other hand, Britain, I think, is well ahead in zoning and 

 greenbelts, in rehabilitation of derelict lands, in natural science re- 

 search for conservation, and in evolving a coordinated system of 

 land use priority. 



Britain has also a great heritage of landscape assets. This im- 

 presses visitors. What impresses us is the speed with which the 

 assets are being thrown away. On the whole, our respective strong 

 and weak points are complementary, so mutual aid is indicated. For 

 this, we need a picture of the flow process. What I suggest very 

 briefly is this : First comes a better understanding of the whole field. 

 A conference like this is excellent, so long as someone has done 

 the homework the thinking, the survey and above all, the research 

 to give us the basic facts to analyze and synthesize the real problems 

 and to hammer out guidelines. This means more ecological re- 

 search, more applied ecological studies for conservation, more sur- 

 vey and inventory work, more social science studies on uses, more 

 technological analysis of the human impact on the land. We have 

 more work to do in the storage and retrieval of data. Never forget 

 that research, properly directed and used, is in itself a most impor- 

 tant form of action. 



The second area is education. Time is so short that I merely 

 stress here the need for the landscaping profession to have a com- 

 mon training in conservation and land use as exists in the ecological 



