42 THE DEVELOPMENT OF BRITISH FORESTRY 



the bulk of their raw material from own woods, they have 

 become much more careful of them. For the above 

 reasons it may be taken for granted that a large part of 

 the Swedish forests are in a state of transition, and are 

 at present suffering from the effects of the gross waste 

 which obtained in the sixties and seventies. It would, 

 however, in the writer's opinion, be imprudent to infer 

 that we are likely to witness a timber famine in Sweden, 

 although it is probable that the quantity of building wood 

 of Scots pine and spruce shipped from that country will 

 have to be reduced for a time. 



' The total area of the Swedish woodlands is estimated 

 at about 52,412,000 English acres (equal to about 51 per 

 cent, of the total area of the country), of which Norrland 

 and Dalecarlia contain 35,091,000 acres. Of these forests 

 the State and other public authorities own about 17,520,000 

 acres, the management of which is under the care of the 

 Swedish Forest Department. According to the estimate 

 of the Forest Department, these 52,412,000 acres of wood- 

 land are now producing annually about 1,219,426,000 

 cubic feet of wood. This is only a growth of somewhat 

 over 23 cubic feet per acre per annum, an eloquent testi- 

 mony not only to the present condition of the woods, 

 but of their future potentiality. These Swedish woods 

 consist nearly exclusively of Scots pine and spruce, with 

 a sprinkling of birch and alder, and it is the two former 

 descriptions, which supply a large portion of the softwoods 

 consumed in the United Kingdom, to which these remarks 

 principally apply. In this connection it is instructive 

 to find that, while the 11,500,000 acres of State forest in 

 Germany bring in a nett annual revenue of about 8s. an 

 acre to the State, the Swedish State forests only produce a 

 nett profit of about 6d. an acre ! It should, of course, be 

 mentioned that the bulk of the Swedish State forests are 

 situated in the extreme north of the country, near to the 



