1306 



A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



TABLE 1. Average costs per acre of the protection and management of the national 



forests, including Alaska 



1 These fire costs differ from those given in the section, Protection against fire, since the latter are spread 

 over only the 95 million acres of national forests requiring special provision and expenditure for protection, 

 whereas in this table the total costs are spread over the entire national-forest property. Fire costs per acre 

 on only the 95 million acres protected are 5.72 cents for present expenditures and 6.853 cents for proposed. 



Programs of different time intervals have been set up for completion 

 of essential capital investments and increases in current expenditures, 

 depending on the resource, the necessity for completing the jobs to 

 prevent losses, trends in prospective resource requirements, and the 

 magnitude of the task. For example, planting work must be planned 

 a long time ahead; the job is big; therefore expenditures have been 

 figured on a 20-year program. Immediate capital investments to 

 hasten better practice where important values are jeopardized are 

 set up in a short 5-year program, whereas large scale improvements 

 have been set up in 10-year programs. The calculations were made 

 as follows : 



The usual accounting procedure of segregating current expenditures 

 from capital investment charges was followed. The current costs 

 represent the usual annual recurring expenditures for protection, 

 resource management, and maintenance of existing improvements. 

 They include such items as salaries, wages, and expenses of personnel 

 and labor employed in protection, resource management, and main- 

 tenance of improvements, roads, and trails. The total annual 

 current expenditure for any activity divided by 161 million acres, 

 gives the per-acre cost for current administration of that activity for 

 the national forests. 



A different procedure was followed in calculating the annual cost 

 per acre for capital investments. The total current expenditure 

 for any capital investment does not represent the annual carrying- 

 charge. To arrive at the correct figure, it was first necessary to sum 

 up the total money spent for each capital investment under each 

 activity. The next step was to depreciate or write off the sum 

 expended, converting this figure to a total annual carrying charge. 

 Interest was not included. This total divided by 161 million acres, 

 gives the annual per acre carrying cost for capital investments. The 

 depreciation and write-off periods used were based on the best 



