Forest Resources and the Nation's Economy 



Adequate protection against fire, in- 

 sects, and disease will reduce the losses 

 of merchantable timber and save for 

 future timber production millions of 

 seedlings and saplings now destroyed 

 each year. Planting a substantial part 

 of the 75 million acres now denuded or 

 only poorly stocked with seedlings and 

 saplings would lay the foundations for 

 additional timber growth in the future. 

 But improved forest practices applied 

 to the timber now standing are the 

 surest and quickest means of increasing 

 annual growth. 



A crop of wood cannot be grown in 

 a single year like a crop of corn. To- 

 morrow's wood supply is in the trees 



721 



growing in the forests today. It will 

 take decades of good forestry, going 

 far beyond what has been accomplished 

 in the past, to develop a well-balanced 

 growing stock that will meet future 

 timber needs. 



C. EDWARD BEHRE is staff consultant 

 in the Forest Service. He was grad- 

 uated from Yale with a master's degree 

 in forestry in 1917. From 1919 to 1923 

 he was on the faculty of the School of 

 Forestry at the University of Idaho. 

 Mr. Behre joined the staff of the North- 

 eastern Forest Experiment Station at 

 the time of its organization in 1923 

 and was its director from 1929 to 1942. 



FOREST RESOURCES AND THE NATION'S ECONOMY 



EDWARD C. CRAFTS, MARTHA A. DIETZ 



Natural resources and human in- 

 genuity determine a country's wealth, 

 security, standing among nations, and 

 the welfare of its people. 



One of the natural resources is the 

 forest, which supplies timber, water, 

 forage, wildlife, and spiritual strength. 



So common are the products and 

 services of the forest in everyday living 

 that their presence often is taken for 

 granted and their essentiality over- 

 looked. But when one analyzes the 

 relationship of the forest to the Na- 

 tion's economy and considers all the 

 products and services, he sees the part 

 they have in the lives of all the people. 



INDUSTRY AND TRADE, to a large de- 

 gree, depend on natural resources. 

 Such dependency is sometimes obvious., 

 more often obscure, and rarely tied to 

 only one resource. Nevertheless, one 

 standard for measuring the value of 

 any resource is the size and essentiality 

 of that segment of industry and trade 

 so closely tied to it that the dependency 

 relationship is obvious. The forest sup- 

 ports directly dependent industries 

 impressive both in variety and size. 



The growing of timber is the most 



802062 49 47 



obvious function of the forest. Timber, 

 widely adaptable, is the backbone of a 

 large group of conversion industries. 

 With only crude shaping, splitting, or 

 cutting, wood can be used as it comes 

 from the forest for fuel wood, posts, 

 mine props, piling, and other rough 

 uses. With relatively little processing, 

 it is used as sawed lumber, shingles, 

 railroad ties, veneers, and charcoal. In 

 further processed form, it is consumed 

 in housing, boxes and crates, cooper- 

 age, furniture, agricultural imple- 

 ments, truck bodies, boats, Venetian 

 blinds, baseball bats, and pencils. It is 

 the basic raw material in pulp, paper, 

 rayon, and a variety of other products. 

 Extracts used in the tanning of hides 

 and skins are produced from wood and 

 the bark of certain trees. In addition, 

 the living tree itself is a production 

 plant for pine oleoresin, which is the 

 raw material for turpentine, rosin, and 

 other naval stores. 



Since the Second World War, the 

 average annual gross value of all tim- 

 ber products is estimated at 15 to 20 

 billion dollars. 



Harvesting and primary manufac- 

 ture of most timber products is con- 



