^ 7 ATIONAL AFFORESTATION 



the part of the owners not only to strictly 

 conserve what is left, but restock the denuded 

 areas as quickly as possible. It therefore 

 stands to reason that private enterprise can 

 do little in the afforesting of large areas of 

 waste land, which must be left entirely in the 

 hands of the State. 



Public bodies have in the past done ex- 

 cellent work in the planting of catchment 

 areas of waterworks and mine-heaps, but 

 such is infinitesimal when compared with 

 what is required. 



At the commencement of the war we had, 

 roughly speaking, 3,000,000 acres of wood- 

 lands, much of which required thinning, in 

 addition to which the quantity of field and 

 hedgerow timber was a big and valuable asset. 

 But, in addition to this, we have been receiv- 

 ing consignments of mining timber from 

 France and other sources, and had, when the 

 war commenced, a fairly good stock in hand 

 of foreign woods. It has been carefully com- 

 puted that a million acres of woodland have 

 been denuded for war purposes, while minor 



54 



