Report of the Minister of Lands and Forests 

 of the Province of Ontario 



For the Year ending 31st October, 1927 



GENERAL ADMINISTRATION 



All the natural resources of the Province, exclusive of the minerals and 

 the game and fish, come particularly under the jurisdiction of the Department 

 of Lands and Forests. Even the wild life of the great Provincial Parks is sub- 

 ject to the control and administration of this Department. The land, timber, 

 water powers and wild life are our heritage. When it is considered that the 

 great Pulp and Paper Industry, with the Lumbering, has operated more effec- 

 tually than any other wide movement to create favourable trade balances in the 

 international money markets and from a commercial and labour viewpoint it is 

 of such vital import to the people of the Province, the necessity of taking pre- 

 cautionary measures to perpetuate the industry is obvious. The greatest care, 

 therefore, must be exercised in developing our forest wealth along lines of per- 

 petuating its possibilities, and it is the desire and intention of the Department 

 to extend its influence towards educating the masses to an adequate under- 

 standing of the storehouse of treasures that belong to them and deserve 

 protection. 



The magnitude of the Province, with its spacious areas of so diversified a 

 character, should immediately challenge the attention of all public-spirited 

 citizens. 



Timely steps are being taken by the Government to segregate the barren 

 from the productive, to make a business-like inventory of our natural holdings 

 and provide the readiest solution to the problem of protecting Nature's gifts 

 for the benefit of the public. 



Large unproductive sections in the past have been wantonly exploited, 

 ostensibly for sustaining man in an agricultural sense, but in reality for gaining 

 a temporary livelihood, after which the effort of eking out an existence conduces 

 to conditions not at all advaatageous to the individual or society. It is there- 

 fore the duty of the Crown to administer its domain that a fair division of its 

 products may result. Limiting those who desire to farm to lands that are 

 primarily tillable and suitable for agricultural purposes is of special considera- 

 tion. If Canada is to remain the granary of the Empire a "back to the land" 

 cry should be forever in our minds and Ontario with her expansive clay lands, 

 in its northern portions especially, appeals to the sturdy type who can handle 

 the saw and wield the axe. There is no countrv in the world to-day with greater 

 advantages for the man of little wealth and thrift who wishes to hew out, develop 

 and maintain a home. Encouraging this pioneer type is the effort of the 

 Department of Lands and Forests. 



There are large sections of our country, both in Southern and Northern 

 Ontario, which are decreed by Nature to produce nothing but a crop of timber, 

 and such sections should be inevitably withheld from further futile attempts at 

 farming and fenced, theoretically speaking, for the reproduction of a timber 



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