The Outlook for the World's Timber Supply. 



By Professor W. Somerville, Oxford University, England. 



(Read at the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, 



Winnipeg, Man., Aug. 31st, and published by permission of the author). 



During the past twenty years, but 

 more particularly during the past ten or 

 twelve, much attention has been given 

 to the question of the world's timber 

 supplies, and I think T may say all who 

 have critically examined the position 

 have come to the conclusion that the 

 outlook is not reassuring. 



The international trade in timber can 

 only be described as colossal. Britain 

 possesses a very small area of wood- 

 lands, and her structural timber is 

 practically all imported. On the average 

 of the five years ending with 1893 her 

 bill for foreign wood was some eighteen 

 millions sterling, while fifteen years 

 later — namely, on the average of the five 

 years ending with 1908 — it exceeded 

 twenty-seven millions, an increase of 

 more than fifty per cent. To this must 

 be added the imports of wood products 

 (cork, caoutchouc, rosin, bark, turpen- 

 tine, wood pulp, etc.), which fifteen 

 years ago were valued at six and a half 

 millions, but now total seventeen 

 millions sterling. Germany possesses 

 nearly thirty-five million acres of forests, 

 as compared with Britain's three million 

 acres, and yet she pays annually some 

 tw^elve millions sterling for foreign 

 timber. The combined imports of 

 timber into France and Belgium also 

 aggregate about twelve millions sterling, 

 while Italy, Spain, Portugal, Denmark 

 and Holland are also large importers. 



In Europe the chief countries with 

 surplus supplies are Sweden, with annual 

 exports valued at about fourteen millions 

 sterling; Russia and Austria-Hungary, 

 each of which receives about eleven 

 millions sterling per annum for exported 

 wood, and Norway, whose timber- 

 exports exceed four millions sterling. 



Outside Europe the only two coun- 

 tries that export timber to a large 

 extent are Canada and the United 

 States; the annual exports of the former 

 being valued at about eight millions, 

 while those of the latter exceed twenty 

 millions. Both countries are also large 

 importers of wood, the United States 



paying annually over twenty millions 

 sterling for wood and wood products, 

 the corresponding figure for Canada be- 

 ing not much short of two millions. 



Notwithstanding the fact that iron, 

 concrete and other substances are being 

 largely used as substitutes for timber, 

 the consumption of the latter is steadily 

 and rapidly increasing, and the question 

 comes to be : Can the supply be inde- 

 finitely maintained? In any particular 

 area of woodland it is comparatively 

 easy to estimate what the annual 

 gro^'th amounts to, and if no more is 

 annually removed than is annually 

 produced it is evident that the supply 

 will be maintained in perpetuity. But 

 it is impossible to apply any such simple 

 method of estimation to the forests of 

 the world, for the reason that their area, 

 growing stock and productive capacity 

 are not known with sufficient definite- 

 ness. The method can, however, be 

 applied to single countries where system- 

 atic forestry has been practised for a 

 long period. Anyone familiar with the 

 conditions in France or Germany, for 

 instance, knows that there will be no 

 falling off in the output of timber of 

 these countries. Their woodland areas 

 have been long subjected to systematic 

 management, and the crops that they 

 bear are almost as much the result of 

 human activity as a crop of wheat. A 

 similar condition of things prevails in 

 Austria-Hungary, Italy and Denmark, 

 and is probably not materially different 

 in Spain, Servia and Roumania. 



The European countries regarding 

 which much uncertainty prevails are 

 exactly those on which the world's 

 international market mainly depends for 

 supplies, namely, Scandinavia and 

 Russia. The timber exported from 

 these countries is practically all supplied 

 by natural or primeval forests, that is to 

 say, it is not the result of cultural or 

 administrative methods. It has cost 

 nothing to produce, and is as much a 

 free gift of nature as coal, iron or lime- 

 stone. Such forests have been exploited 



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