PHILANTHROPY OR EFFICIENCY 



BY ARTHUR NEWTON PACK 



A LL too often forestry is regarded solely as a philan- 

 ** thropic scheme which begins and ends with planting 

 trees, an appeal to our sentiment which permits us to 

 write down our contributions in our account books or our 

 consciences with a considerable feeling of moral satisfac- 

 tion. Unfortunately this impression is shared even by 

 some of the business heads of our lumber and wood-using 

 industries, and as it is undoubtedly true that a good many 

 thoroughly impractical ideas have been given out under 

 the name of forestry, perhaps the business man, whose 

 creed must necessarily be based on Results, is not whol- 

 ly to blame for his attitude. All the talk of the news- 

 papers and periodicals of the country about a timber 

 shortage is not likely to influence the lumberman who has 



Practical forestry neither begins nor ends with any such 

 attitude ; it is essentially the efficiency engineering of 

 the wood-using industries, and un-til both foresters and 

 managers fully appreciate this viewpoint there can be 

 little progress in the industrial application of forestry 

 principles. 



Some of the largest newsprint manufacturing concerns 

 in Canada are now pioneering in the practical application 

 of forest engineering. It already seems likely that several 

 others will follow the new lead. There will be some who 

 say that it is a mistake or even a heresy to confuse for- 

 est engineering with forestry, because forest engineering 

 is essentially the application of engineering study to the 

 problems of cutting, log-hauling, and delivery to the mill. 



NEWSPAPERS ARE MADE FROM THIS 



Piles of pulpwood at a pulp mill ready to go to the paper mill and be made into great rolls of newsprint of which we use two 



million tons a year in our newspapers. 



in sight for his own mill a supply of timber which he 

 deems sufficient to pay a fair profit and amortize his 

 mill and investment, unless he realizes that the applica- 

 tion of forestry methods will not so greatly diminish that 

 earning power upon which he must count, that the future 

 saving will not be worth while. If he smiles at the talk 

 of scientific cutting and treating timber as a successively 

 maturing crop, it is only because he can see nothing but 

 the expense of adopting the new methods. 



Now that the great wood-using, industries everywhere, 

 and particularly the pulp and paper companies, are hiring 

 foresters and building nurseries for raising tree seedlings, 

 he may find it wise not to appear less progressive ; but a 

 forestry department organized without a definite or prac- 

 tical policy is from the beginning classed as a purely phil- 

 anthropic side line, and as such is forever handicapped. 



and they believe it is simply scientific forest destruction. 

 The more modern viewpoint, which emanates from a 

 group of American and Canadian foresters, is that the 

 practical forester is so much the more able to handle his 

 special problems of reproduction of timber, if he under- 

 stands its present as well as its future connection with the 

 dollars and cents of business. These men have studied 

 the woods as actual members of the logging crews, seen 

 at first hand the shortcomings of obsolete systems, and 

 by the demonstration of their ability to show where real 

 economies can be introduced, are winning the confidence 

 of their directors to the broader application of forest 

 conservation. They have determined to stamp out the 

 old philanthropy idea. 



In eastern Canada, Maine, and part of New Hamp- 

 shire and New York, pulp wood is brought to the mills 



