176 



Canadian Forestry Journal, April, ic)20. 



trial crisis, the prices of lumber will 

 never be very much lower, at least, 

 until \xQ attain the adjustments of a 

 stabilized industrial development and 

 ''s several generations ahead of 

 us. The demand increases, the supply 

 decreases, the prices go up. AVhat 

 else can you expect? It will cost you 

 more to build your houses in the 

 future. The furniture you put into 

 your houses will cost you more than 

 at present. Your newspapers will 

 cost you more. Everything into which 

 wood products enter will increase in 

 price largely because you have neg- 

 lected to protect and conserve your 

 great natural forest resources lying 

 on non-agricultural land'^, almost at 

 your doors. I say the high prices of 

 lumber are here to stay, and I will 

 also say that they will go still higher 

 unless the public that owns the for- 

 ests initiate at once recuperative 

 measures. The sooner the great in- 

 dustrial consumers " of wood fibre 

 realize this the better. If the news- 

 paper publishers know where their 

 bread is buttered, they will use their 

 columns much more extensively and 

 effectively than they have in the past 

 in the endeavor to convince the pub- 

 lic that we cannot wantonly deplete 

 our forest resources without paying 

 the price, and consequently urge 

 methods of handling our forests that 

 will keep them in continuously pro- 

 ductive condition. 



What High Prices Entail. 

 Personally, although I am a house- 

 holder, I welcome the coming of high 

 prices of forest products, for on the 

 whole they will work out advantage- 

 ously to the forest and to the com- 

 munity. The higher the price of 

 lumber, the greater will be the value 

 of our forests, and consequently the 

 greater will be their protection. We 

 protect the things we value. We have 

 destroyed our forests in the past be- 

 cause we held them cheap. We were 

 not sufficiently interested to insist on 

 their protection. We will get the 

 more interested, however, the more 

 we feel the financial pinch of dimin- 

 ishing supplies. The greater their 

 value, the more intensive will be their 



cultivation. We cultivate the crops 

 that pay best. 



Re-invest the Forest Revenues 



I trust you will not consider me 

 tinged with red when I assert my be- 

 lief that the community should share 

 in the increased price .of lumber. In 

 British Columbia, for example, when 

 the market value of lumber goes 

 above a certain price agreed upon as 

 furnishing the producer a reasonable 

 profit on his investment, the royalties 

 exacted by the province increase in 

 definite ratio. Thus the people as a 

 whole, profit by the upward trend of 

 prices. I would suggest that a cer- 

 tain portion of such graduated tax be 

 re-invested in the forest by the com- 

 munity to accelerate the regeneration 

 and growth of the commercial species 

 and thus keep our woodlands at our 

 market doors, continuously produc- 

 tive. Most private business is sus- 

 tained by a re-investment of a certain 

 portion of its profits. The communi- 

 ties' forest business can be sustained 

 only in the same manner. The Do- 

 minion Government spends about $3,- 

 000,000 a year for the encouragement 

 of agriculture, Avhich is another way 

 of saying that amount is re-invested 

 in the bvtsiness of increasing the pro- 

 ductivity of the farm soil. The forest 

 soil products have a value equal to 

 that of our wheat crop, yet we are re- 

 investing almost nothing to continue 

 its productivity. The lumber indus- 

 try created for Canada in 191 7 forest 

 products valued at $116,000,000. The 

 pulp mills of the country produced in 

 the same year materials to the value 

 of $96,000,000, a total of over $200,- 

 000,000. The lumber and pulpwood 

 industries stand third as producers 

 of wealth in this country, being sur- 

 passed only by agriculture and manu- 

 facturing. A¥e re-invest a portion of 

 the earnings of agriculture and of 

 manufacturing to keep these indus- 

 tries going, but with the exception of 

 spasmodic planting we have reinvest- 

 ed very little of the forest revenues 

 to encourage the regeneration of the 

 present commercial species. We must 

 do this. We must re-invest a certain 



