The Commissioners favour the continuance of the plan 

 already adopted by Parliament in creating a ' "block" ten-year 

 period for the purpose of financing the State forests. They 

 are of the opinion, however, that the difficulties already en- 

 countered and inherent to beginning work on a ten-year 

 block grant, due to the slender basis on which to estimate and 

 the unforeseeable changes in prices and values, as well as the 

 uncertainty as to the government's policy at the end of the 

 period, make some change of the arrangement desirable. 



" Forestry," they assert with truth, "is obviously not a 

 subject which can be taken up or dropped at will without 

 serious loss of efficiency." 



They suggest that, while adhering to the ten-year block 

 grant system, Parliament should also systematically review 

 progress at the middle of each recurring period and simul- 

 taneously make provision for a further ten-year program, which 

 in turn would be reviewed and extended after an interval of 

 five years. 



The suggestion will appeal to all practical foresters wherever 

 a State forestry policy is under consideration. Much of the 

 lack of success of forestry policies and many of the difficulties 

 encountered are traceable to haphazard or short-period legisla- 

 tion and to the failure at the outset to devise a permanent 

 policy that will ensure continuity of effort and give to the 

 practical foresters sufficient scope to make their works effective. 



Pending the adoption of some such permanent policy by 

 Parliament the British Forestry Commission is acquiring 

 land by lease and purchase as fast as suitable areas are obtain- 

 able and bringing it under forest cultivation, as well as carry- 

 ing on other sections of their program. The lands thus ac- 

 quired are forest areas which were partly or wholly denuded 

 to supply Britain with wood during the war, or grazing and 

 other non-agricultural lands more suited for tree-growing 

 than for other purposes. 



Prior to the war the United Kingdom possessed about 

 3,000,000 acres of woodlands which yielded every year some 

 45,000,000 cubic feet of timber. It imported wood and wood 

 products, including woodpulp, to an amount equivalent to 

 550,000,000 cubic feet of standing timber. These imports, an 

 enquiry disclosed, increased fivefold between 1850 and 1910. 

 Consumption rose during the same period from 3^ to 11 cubic 



