164 Canadian Forestry Journal. 



in woodlands by farmers and lumbermen where there is no danger 

 of loss by fire, and the average Ontario forest tree certainly 

 requires full 60 years to reach maturity. On this basis the equit- 

 able rate for woodland taxation will be 17% of that for lands 

 under farm crops, or in other terms, when the ordinary rate is 

 10 mills, the rate for woodlands should be 1.7 mills. 



///. — Woodland Tax Exemption. 



There are several reasons which may be urged in favor of 

 the remission of part or all the taxes on such woodlands as are 

 maintained wholly for the production of timber, and which 

 receive sufficient intelligent care to keep them up to a reasonable 

 standard of production. They are 



(i) The value of woodlands to the community in general 

 by virtue of the beneficent influence exerted on the climate by 

 moderating the force of heavy winds and by favorably in- 

 fluencing the humidity and temperature of the atmosphere ; and 

 by the very favorable influence exerted in regulating the flow 

 of streams. 



(2) The long time element in the maturing of a forest crop 

 is a great discouragement in wood production. There is no line 

 of business in which men ordinarily engage which requires the 

 looking forward for more than a decade or at most two decades. 

 Timber growing, however, requires the constant planning in 

 advance for 60, 80, or even 100 years. So profound is the in- 

 fluence of this long time element that the great law of supply 

 and demand is paralyzed. To illustrate: If the demand for 

 wheat increases in relation to the available supply, the price 

 rises, the farmers sow a larger acreage, and presently the in- 

 creased demand has resulted in an increased supply. The 

 same is true of hogs and horses, or of any other commodity 

 which may be reproduced or even mined, except wood. The 

 demand for w^ood has steadily and tremendously increased 

 decade by decade for upwards of a century. The prices, notwith- 

 standing the opening up of vast virgin forests which cost man 

 nothing to produce, have steadily risen, and during the last 

 decade, as exhaustion of supplies is seen in the distance, have 

 very rapidly risen. This rise in price has not yet resulted in an 

 increased production of wood, nor will it — judging from the 

 history of nations — ever appreciably increase the production 

 of wood until the evils of a wood famine have long been felt. On 

 the contrary, although increased demand has meant increased 

 prices, increased prices have only meant increased harvesting, 

 and increased harvesting has meant and still means in North 

 America that larger areas are annually cut over and cut more 

 closely. This on account of the greater amount of debris left 



