OUR NATIONAL TIMBER REQUIREMENTS 



By FRANK J. HALLAUER, Principal Engineer 



CONTENTS 



Page 



Introduction 245 



Lumber consumption trends 246 



Pulpwood requirements 258 



Railroad crossties 270 



Fuel wood . 272 



Naval stores 272 



Minor products . 274 



Summary 275 



INTRODUCTION 



The purpose of this analysis is to review past experience and to 

 evaluate current trends in the consumption of wood and other im- 

 portant forest products in the United States, in order to throw as 

 much light as possible on what the Nation's normal needs for such 

 products, translated into terms of timber, may be in the future. 

 The study therefore has to do only with effective demand for forest 

 products as commodities of consumption, leaving to other discussions 

 the needs of the Nation for forests for such purposes as regulation of 

 stream flow, control of erosion, recreation, and fostering of wild life. 



" Requirements" is not a wholly satisfactory term to define the 

 extent of past, present, or future use of wood. Where timber is 

 abundant and easily accessible, " requirements" inevitably absorb a 

 far greater quantity of this cheap and adaptable raw material than 

 would come into demand under other circumstances; competition 

 from other materials is reduced; substitution moves rather in the 

 opposite direction, and wood replaces other more costly and less 

 readily accessible materials. On the other hand, where wood is scarce 

 and hard to get, actual use is not a measure of what requirements 

 might be under more favorable conditions. The community or 

 region may not consciously demand more wood and may yet be at a 

 disadvantage in a number of ways through lack of an abundant 

 supply of wood at hand. 



For want of a better term, however, "requirements" is used, not 

 to denote irreducible needs, but as a measure of use by consumers 

 afforded a reasonable latitude in choice of materials. 



Consumption, while deficient in certain respects as a gage, is the 

 only practical measure of past and current commodity requirements 

 and is therefore accepted in this analysis with such allowances as 

 judgment dictates. An absolute measure of requirements would 

 necessarily be quite theoretical, and unreliable at best. 



Since no one can say precisely what our timber requirements will 

 be at any future time, this report does not attempt to do so. Sound 

 policy making, however, must aim to anticipate requirements with 

 some degree of probability, and this report is an attempt to supply 



245 



