1316 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



The apparently large increase in capital investment is, in the light 

 of the information given in other sections of the report, well justified, 

 if the national forests are to be brought up to their full productive 

 capacity for future returns and public benefits, 



COSTS OF MANAGEMENT AND PROTECTION ON NEW NATIONAL- 

 FOREST UNITS 



A program of acquisition has been set up in the section, The Prob- 

 able Future Distribution of Forest Land Ownership, which provides 

 for the addition of 134.2 million acres to the present national-forest 

 system. Acquisition costs of the land itself are treated elsewhere. 

 Here it is intended only to consider, in brief summary, the costs for 

 management and protection of the new units, excluding outlays for 

 land purchase. 



On the basis of present knowledge, it is reasonable to assume that 

 the per-acre cost for management arid protection on the new units, 

 after the purchase program is entirely completed, will be approxi- 

 mately identical with the figures recommended for existing national 

 forests. But these costs will not be approached until a 20-year 

 period has passed, when all of the basic investments are completed 

 and protection effort is confined solely to Federal lands. Immediate 

 costs and those for the next 5 years depend on many 1 actors, including 

 the rapidity of acquisition and the concentration of purchase areas. 

 The acquisition program proposes an annual addition to the national 

 forest of 5,355,000 acres in the East ard 1,355,000 acres in the West. 

 In the West these additions in the main are already within or reason- 

 ably adjacent to existing national forests. This fact has a material 

 bearing on the amount of money which must be immediately expended 

 for protection and administration of new units. Capital investments 

 especially for protection on existing national forests, contribute con- 

 siderable value to the intermingled and adjacent private lands, which 

 are to be acquired, and hence, in part such investments will not have 

 to be duplicated. The per-acre costs as well as per-acre appropria- 

 tions for management and protection on proposed western additions 

 will, therefore, immediately more nearly approach those on present 

 established forests. 



In the East on the other hand a more difficult problem is presented. 

 Present national forests totaling more than 7 million acres and spread 

 over 19 States form but a fraction of the final national-forest system 

 proposed. Many of the units, particularly those acquired in the first 

 5 years, will be in new territory, distant from existing forests. The 

 proposed annual purchase of 5,355,000 acres in the East cannot 

 logically be concentrated in a few units. If the total area set up in 

 the acquisition program is to be completed within a 20-year period, 

 even if sizeable purchases can be made, these will have to be spread 

 over many States according to need for meeting whatever exceedingly 

 critical situations of national import may exist. In the first 5 years 

 or so of acquisition the result will undoubtedly be skeletonized national 

 forests, in which Federal ownership will be scattered through and 

 intermingled with a large percentage of privately owned land, later 

 to be acquired. Later acquisition will round out the property and 

 will permit concentration of effort. Until this is done, particularly 

 in eastern purchase units, appropriations must provide for capital 

 investments and fire protection for areas that approximate the final 



