AN UNPROVED INDUSTRY 157 



into these areas, once the woods are old enough, 

 acclimatization losses will not have to be faced, since 

 the shelter which the woods will bring should reduce 

 the losses from exposure to a minimum. 



And now as to the second question the acquisi- 

 tion of the land. 



State ownership on any considerable scale may 

 be concluded under existing circumstances as un- 

 practicable. But this does not rule out the State 

 altogether in this respect. It is an accepted economic 

 principle that the State in the interests of its people 

 should demonstrate the economic and pecuniary 

 advantages to be obtained by the introduction of 

 a new industry into the country. 



Commercial forestry is an industry the financial 

 advantages of which are as yet unproved under 

 existing conditions in Great Britain. It would 

 therefore not only be a direct advantage, but becomes 

 a duty, for the State to set the example to private 

 owners by demonstrating beyond a doubt that the 

 industry can be made a paying one. For this pur- 

 pose the State should acquire by purchase a certain 

 area of land in different parts of the country, possess- 

 ing varying capacities, and so capable of growing 

 on a commercially profitable basis the different 

 species of trees for which there exists a demand, 

 both conifers and hard woods. By this means the 

 paying capabilities of the different species, and the 

 ages at which, from the private owner's point of 

 view, they could be most profitably cut, would 

 become demonstrable, and the State would ulti- 

 mately be in a position to judge the crops it could 



