Necessity for Securing Capital for Forest Production in the 

 State of Washington 



Production of timber, it appears from the foregoing, is mainly a 

 question of the investment of capital either by the nation, state, individual, 

 or some other owner. Those owners who must pay or can get high 

 interest rates for the use of capital cannot wisely undertake the produc- 

 tion of timber as an investment, even if they were content with such 

 long term investments, which is seldom the case. High priced capital 

 means high cost of growing timber even more strongly than it means 

 high cost of production in other lines. Yet since the State of Washington 

 has enormous areas fitted only for the growth of timber, or far better 

 for such growth than for any other purpose, it seems exceedingly im- 

 portant that the capital be forthcoming. If capital is not secured, the 

 state will be unable to utilize this area, unproductive for other purposes, 

 and by so much fail to obtain the full productivity that its resources 

 warrant. Failure of this raw material for industry means so much less 

 industry, which is also a very important matter. 



Sources of Capital for Forest Production 



There are four sources of capital which may in a greater or less de- 

 gree be relied upon for large scale forest production, viz., the nation, the 

 state, the municipality, and the large corporation. As previously stated, 

 the cost of capital to practically all others is so high that the well in- 

 formed forester cannot conscientiously recommend forest production as 

 a profitable or even a self supporting enterprise, except in the case of 

 the farm woodlot. Of these four possible sources of capital the munic- 

 ipality may for the present be expected at the most to deal only with 

 city watersheds, although it would be an excellent investment for many 

 cities to secure adjacent tracts of rough lands for forest parks, which 

 could serve, not only for park purposes, but also give revenue to the 

 city. The large corporation cannot be relied upon to furnish the capital 

 now nor at any time in the future until it is definitely decided whether 

 it will have equal privileges with other owners. 



It then devolves chiefly upon the state and nation to raise the neces- 

 sary capital for this need, which a little careful consideration shows to 

 be vital to the state. The State of Washington has done nothing in this 

 line as yet and it will no doubt be difficult for it to devote large sums 

 to this purpose. Instead, therefore, of there being any jealousy of the 

 work of the federal government in forest production, it seems that intel- 

 ligent cooperation should be the uniform rule. The writer expects to 

 see the day when there will be a vigorous demand from the people through 

 members of Congress for the expenditure of government funds for this 

 purpose to the end that the resources of the state may be made as 

 productive as possible. Certainly such productive expenditure is far 

 more important to the state than federal expenditures on government 

 buildings, which merely result in moving government offices out of private 

 buildings, and by so much decrease the demand for space in the latter. 

 The main advantage of these latter expenditures is the purely selfish one, 

 that because of the supposed prodigality of the government, persons who 

 have something to sell (either material or labor) may sell more of it at 

 better prices for the construction of a government building than for a 



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