84 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



distribution costs and methods to the question immediately con- 

 cerned, nor of tariffs and international economic relations in general. 



Improved forest taxation has generally been recognized as an 

 essential feature of any comprehensive forestry program, and it 

 bears directly upon the feasibility of private forestry and upon the 

 coordination of public and private forest land ownership. This 

 problem, which in turn is intimately associated with the whole problem 

 of local taxation and governmental organization and administration, 

 is the subject of a thorough investigation by a special staff, known as 

 the " Forest taxation inquiry of the Forest Service." A comprehen- 

 sive report by that staff is practically completed and will shortly be 

 available. This obviates the necessity for dealing with the matter 

 in the present report. 



The problem of adequate professional forestry training to supply 

 men competent to work out the solution of the forest problems, and 

 to practice forestry under American conditions has for some years 

 been recognized as meriting special consideration. It has not been 

 so much a question of quantity of professional training, as of focusing 

 such training upon, and coordinating it with, the needs peculiar to 

 this country. A recent publication entitled " Forest Education" by 

 Henry S. Graves and Cedric H. Guise, made possible by a grant from 

 the Carnegie Corporation, and conducted under the auspices of the 

 Society of American Foresters, covers this subject, which, therefore, 

 is not dealt with further in this report. 



The data incorporated in the factual sections of this report and 

 which underlie the recommendations herein set forth, are based, to 

 the extent they are available, upon the findings of scientific studies 

 and investigations. Other data, and this applies particularly to 

 those dealing with forest land, forest volumes, growth, requirements, 

 etc., represent the best information available from whatever source, 

 checked by the judgment of well-informed men in the various regions. 

 They do not, in most instances, involve detailed accuracy. The fact 

 is that in the matter of data on these specific aspects of present and 

 potential forest supplies and requirements, there is the greatest need 

 for a thorough-going inventory and analysis as a basis for the develop- 

 ment of plans by private owners, and of policies and programs by 

 public owners regionally and nationally. 



In supplying and presenting factual information, and in formulat- 

 ing programs and recommendations, many agencies and individuals 

 have participated. These include, beside the Forest Service, such 

 bureaus in the Department of Agriculture and in other Departments 

 as the Bureaus of Agricultural Economics, Entomology, Plant 

 Industry, the Biological Survey, the Bureau of Fisheries, the Office 

 of Indian Affairs, and the National Park Service ; also State foresters, 

 and other State officials, as well as private individuals and agencies. 



'This report deals with conditions that are changing, with trends 

 that have altered and are still changing. By the nature of its con- 

 tents the detailed facts are, in many respects, transitory. Even 

 though many of the data are approximations, they have been used 

 carefully, and with a liberal margin of conservatism in the conclusions. 

 The broad outlines of the picture of the forest situation are too clear 

 to be obscured by inaccuracies in the data. The programs recom- 

 mended are presented with confidence that they are justified, and in 

 fact vital, from the standpoint of public welfare. 



