1596 A NATIONAL PLAN FOE AMERICAN FORESTRY 



abandoned agricultural lands will be owned and managed by the 

 public; and 234 million acres of commercial forest lands and 23 million 

 acres of abandoned agricultural lands by private owners. 



ACTION REQUIRED 



In the assumption of responsibilities, the owner of private forest 

 lands must follow certain essential lines of action : 



(a) He should concentrate his holdings on a productive acreage. 

 The use of marginal lands invites failure; the use of submarginal 

 land assures it. 



(b) He should use all of his land, but must not abuse it. 



(c) He must protect his forest property from fire and the ravages 

 of insects and disease. This is largely his responsibility, although the 

 public, because among other things of its stake in his enterprise, will 

 carry a part of the cost. He is expected to carry 25 percent of the 

 total cost of adequate fire protection, except as States finance the 

 non-Federal share; building up to an eventual annual total private 

 expenditure of $5,000,000. 



(d) He must reduce to the minimum the avoidable waste of his 

 resource in harvesting the cut and in the primary manufacture of the 

 products. 



(e) He must build up and maintain a sufficient growing stock on his 

 property and must so regulate his harvesting as to remove the accu- 

 mulated growth with no depletion of his forest capital. Any other 

 line of action will lead inevitably through impoverishment to eventual 

 devastation. The acceptance by all owners of this responsibility 

 would include planting 5,755,000 acres in the next 20 years, and would 

 add to the intensively managed forest area at the rate of 1,500,000 

 acres a year. 



(/) He must carry on such local or special research as may be 

 required to develop his property and its business most profitably. 



(g) He must, through organized effort in the form of trade associa- 

 tions or otherwise, develop markets for his products, perfect methods 

 of distribution, and extend and strengthen his financial structure and 

 credit facilities. 



Private owners of forest land are numbered in the millions, are dis- 

 tributed throughout all forest regions, are highly individualistic in 

 thought and action and their problems of forest technique, of utiliza- 

 tion, of marketing, and of financing are many, varied, and complex. 

 In general, private forest owners do not today play their part in the 

 national effort as organized groups. It must be expected that great 

 differences in responsiveness to such a program will be found as 

 between individuals and regions. 



To carry out acceptably their part in the national program, it is 

 highly desirable that private owners develop greater industrial 

 solidarity, and organize for greater strength both within and for the 

 group as a whole. The growers of wood today are as highly indi- 

 vidualized as any industry in the country and have suffered greatly 

 in consequence. Their customers, their competitors, their financiers, 

 and their distributors are, in the main, well organized to protect and 

 advance their own interests. United action will be necessary to 

 provide for extension of uses, in markets and in facilities. Adequate 

 protection from fire will require cooperative effort. The American 



