PAPER FAMINE IF FORESTS ARE WASTED 



95 



pulp mills which produce approximately 2,100 tons of 

 paper a day, of which 89 per cent is available for export. 

 Of all supplies of paper, wood and pulp used by the 

 United States about one-third now comes from Canada. 



While the supplies of pulp wood in Alaska and the 

 Northwest are very great, only about five per cent of the 

 mills are located in those regions. So long as publishers 

 can obtain Canadian paper more cheaply than they can 

 get it from the West, it is to be expected that they will 

 buy from Canada. Nevertheless, there are several fac- 

 tors which should gradually bring western paper into 

 competition with the eastern Canadian product, according 

 to forest experts. There are quantities of wood in the 

 West available at stumpage prices much less than in the 

 Northeast. Much of this wood is on the National For- 

 ests, and, therefore, is available without the carrying 

 charges that must be figured against large investments 

 in land. Furthermore, the yield per acre of forests is 

 much greater in the West than in the eastern Canadian 

 forests, and there are large water powers available in the 

 West. Certain disadvantages, such as high wages and 

 high freight charges, must be recognized in considering 

 the supplies in the West, but it is believed that these do 

 not counteract the advantages. 



The Forest Service points out, however, that whether 

 paper interests rely upon Canada, or upon increased use 

 of our western resources, in either case these are tem- 

 porary expedients. In the long run the country must 

 solve the paper problem on the basis of a permanent 

 wood supply. To this end it is urged that mill 

 waste be utilized for paper making and that the forests 

 of this country be regenerated and administered on a 

 more productive basis. 



Mill waste, including slabs and edgings, is well dapted 

 for paper making by one of the three chemical processes 

 now commonly employed. But only about three per cent 

 of the wood used for pulp is mill waste, and this is evi- 

 dently a very small portion of all the slabs and edgings 

 from spruce, fir and hemlock now being made into 

 lumber. Here, undoubtedly, is a big field for develop- 

 ment, as it is estimated that there must be an annual 

 waste of 1,600,000 cords of these species alone. 



Even more important than the utilization of mill waste 

 is the regeneration of the forests for the perpetuation of 

 the paper industry in the United States. The policy of 

 wastefully cutting the forests and making little provision 

 for future growth must be abandoned speedily, say forest 

 experts. In the future, operations should be so conduct- 

 ed as to secure increasing reproduction of trees valuable 

 for lumber and pulp. Fortunately such species as fir and 

 poplar are prolific seeders and may be reproduced natur- 

 ally. Spruce may be reproduced under proper methods 

 of forest management, though with more difficulty. As 

 the cost of pulp wood increases, investments in planta- 

 tions, especially in the neighborhood of pulp mills, will 

 commend themselves. The growing of large quantities 

 of wood close to the mills will greatly reduce the cost 

 of lumbering and transportation. Young, thrifty, grow- 



ing forests will produce yields scarcely imagined by one 

 who has been accustomed to deal exclusively with old 

 timber. It is urgently recommended that in this con- 

 nection the practice of Sweden be given serious consid- 

 eration. In that country the mills employ technically 

 trained foresters who prepare accurate figures concerning 

 the yearly growth of the forests which serve as a rigid 

 basis for the annual cut of timber. 



It is the wood-using industries, rather than the lumber 

 companies, that are especially interested in applying con- 

 servation to the national lumber supply, according to the 

 Forest Service. Likewise, it is the publishers rather than 

 the pulp companies which must eventually pay the penalty 

 for wasteful lumbering and which must, therefore, take 

 it upon themselves to guarantee the perpetuation of the 

 nation's pulp supplies. 



FORESTS IN JAPAN 



?VT* HE United States may well imitate Japan in the care 



A with which it enforces its forest conservation laws," 

 says a well-informed teacher much interested in forestry 

 problems, who has recently returned from the Orient. 

 "In Japan, all the wooded land is carefully guarded, prac- 

 tically every tree on the government forest land is listed 

 and not one is allowed to be cut down except with express 

 permission of the government, and then not unless an- 

 other tree is at once planted in its place." 



About four-sevenths of the forests of Japan are owned 

 by the state. As is well known, Japan is not much of an 

 agricultural country, its farms being very small and in- 

 tensively cultivated, but the greater part of the country 

 is occupied by mountains largely covered by forests. It 

 has about 50,000,00 acres of forest land, including cedars, 

 pines, cypresses and firs, with some oaks, maples, beeches, 

 willows, etc. Few of the trees, however, attain a great 

 size, and for large dimensions and long lengths of timber 

 Japan imports wood from America. 



One of the interesting and grotesque sights in Japanese 

 parks and houseyards is the presence of many deformed 

 trees those twisted into human or animal shapes. Some 

 of these deformed trees are very small, so that they may 

 be placed on a windowledge, and for such bizarre plants 

 the equivalent of perhaps two thousand dollars will be 

 paid. 



But little wood is used in Japan for dwellings, because 

 they are usually simple in structure, have paper walls, 

 doors of square lattice work covered with paper and such 

 building makeshifts. 



Much lumber is used in jinrikisha and match factories, 

 of which there are many. Enormous numbers of matches 

 are made each year, mostly for Oriental trade, this being 

 one of Japan's principal industries. Her great shipbuild- 

 ing yards require a large amount of lumber and her pre- 

 tentious shipbuilding program for 1919 promises greatly 

 to increase the demand for both native and imported 

 lumber. 



