Forest Land Taxation. 149 



owning the land, get $2.50 for each tree felled. These regulations 

 vary from year to year, according to the place where cutting is 

 being done. The same system is also followed in Siam. 



As an incentive to replanting " cut over" areas in some parts 

 of the Black Forest, not only are plants supplied free of charge 

 or money premiums given for planting, but also remission of all 

 land taxation is granted for twenty years, for the land planted, 

 which means that it is tax free, until it yields a small return 

 again, which it does by that time in the locality referred to. 



At the present time a method of getting forest preservation 

 practised, and with it a certain amount of forestry, would be to 

 remit all taxation of land under forest or woodland on farms for 

 ten years and then after that tax it on the 17-100 basis. 



Those people who notoriously made no attempt at preserving 

 any woodland on their farms might be made to pay double the 

 prevailing rate. If such a law were handled in a liberal spirit, 

 and not too harshly, much might be done to promote rational 

 woodcraft on the farm. Half the fees made by taxing the non- 

 forestry -inclined-farmers might be given to those who undertook 

 extensive planting operations in the older settled portions of the 

 country. This refers primarily to the Province of Ontario. 

 The land office might co-operate with the Forestry Department 

 in gathering this information as to the planting done each year. 



It is to be hoped that others will continue the discussion 

 of this subject of Forest Taxation so that some practical action 

 may be taken as an answer to this most important question 

 bearing on the forestry problem in Canada. Upon it turns 

 largely the future of the forest, and for that reason its importance 

 cannot be overrated. 



A. HAROLD UNWIN, 



Assistant Conservator of Forests. 



Benin City, W. Africa, April 19th, 1906. 



