A NATIONAL PLAN FOB AMERICAN FORESTRY 681 



FOREST ECONOMICS 



One of the important classes of research in forest economics deals 

 with the forest resource, which consists of such things as the stand of 

 timber, the area of forest land, and the actual and potential growing 

 capacity of the land. Within this field it has been possible since the 

 World War to make three compilations of existing data for the entire 

 country. The results, although largely approximate, have given 

 a clearer conception of the extent of the resource nationally and 

 regionally, and also of some of the sweeping economic changes which 

 are affecting the forest problem with all others. Some data have been 

 collected on the recreation, range, and game aspects of the forest 

 resource, etc., but little on that of watershed protection. 



A second important class of economic research deals with national 

 and regional production or consumption of forest products and with 

 requirements for these products. The collection of data on produc- 

 tion or consumption has been under way for many years, largely in 

 cooperation with the Bureau of the Census. The data are unequal 

 in character, those on lumber, for example, being much more accurate 

 and frequent than those on fuelwood, a product of importance second 

 only to lumber in drain on the forest. Also constituting a drain on 

 the forest are losses from forest fires on which approximate data 

 have been obtained annually for a number of years, and from forest 

 insects and diseases on which rough data have been compiled occasion- 

 ally. From time to time also statistics of use by States or other local 

 units have been obtained for most or all classes of forest products, but 

 much less frequently and completely than those on production. 

 Data have also been collected on recreational use, range use, and game 

 production. 



A Nation-wide forest survey was inaugurated in the fiscal year 1930. 

 One purpose is to supply much more intensive and authoritative 

 data than have heretofore been available on the forest resource. 

 A second purpose is an intensive study of requirements. Since at the 

 present rate the survey will require at least 10 years more for comple- 

 tion, it is important for many reasons that the work be speeded up. 

 The desirability of keeping the data reasonably current after the 

 work is first completed will be recognized, and this will require 

 practically continuous but relatively small-scale work indefinitely 

 for the entire United States. 



Some of the problems of the forest industries are of sufficient 

 public interest to justify investigation by publicly supported investiga- 

 tive organizations and constitute a third class of economic research. 

 Work of this character has included more or less intensive studies 

 of the lumber industry, including its economic status, the distribution 

 of lumber, and various other public aspects, and of the pulp and paper 

 industry, with particular reference to the possibility of obtaining 

 future supplies of pulp wood much more largely or entirely from the 

 United States. 



A fourth general class of investigation deals with the economics of 

 forest management and forest land use. Work to date has included 

 a study, still in its early stages, of costs and returns from timber 

 growing, or, in a broader sense, the financial aspects of forestry, in 

 one important region, the South. This is an aspect of forestry 

 on which information is very sketchy and unsatisfactory. Work 



