148 FORESTS OF SIBERIA AND TURKESTAN 



worked or which would have justified their being 

 exploited — to wit, favourable communications and a 

 demand — have been absent. The forests have been 

 for the most part untouched. For instance, according 

 to the framed estimates in 1911, no less an amount 

 than 1,800,750,000 cubic feet of timber were available 

 for sale from the State forests. Of this amount 

 171,500,000 cubic feet only were disposed of, or some- 

 thing under 10 per cent. In some parts as, e.g., in the 

 Government of Enessey, the percentage sold was as 

 low as 51. 



As has been shown, the population is very sparse, 

 and in many parts owned areas of forest sufficient for 

 its requirements, and so had no reason or necessity 

 for having recourse to the State forests. Of export 

 trade until recently there was none. 



There appears to be Httle doubt that one of the chief 

 sources of the wealth of Asiatic Russia will be found 

 in its forests, and will be reflected in its export trade. 

 Already such a trade has developed, and these forests 

 are taking a place in the international timber markets 

 of the world. Up to the outbreak of the Great War, 

 Russia's chief competitors in the timber markets were 

 Austria-Hungary, Sweden, and Norway, and the 

 United States and Canada. Already, however, Russia 

 was looking to taking a bigger place in the competition 

 with her rivals, and so far as Great Britain was con- 

 cerned, she out-distanced them all, since we took about 

 35 per cent, of our total imports from Russia. To 

 maintain the position in the markets she has already 

 acquired, and the greater one she must inevitably take 

 in the future as the exports frotn her rivals diminish 



