AFFORESTATION OF CATCHMENT AREAS 79 



carry out the work on the only lines that would ensure 

 success, namely, the planting to be spread over a term of 

 years, to be uninterrupted, and to be carried out in large 

 blocks, in no case of less than 500 acres each. It will be 

 difficult to induce private landowners to undertake, out of 

 their diminished incomes, afforestation schemes on the large 

 and continuous scale that is essential to success. 



In the case of water catchment areas belonging to 

 corporations, the question of continuous ownership is 

 solved ; and the agreement entered into on 1 8th August 

 1914 by the Liverpool Corporation with the Development 

 Commissioners is a workable financial scheme that can be 

 adopted generally. The Treasury provides the money 

 necessary for planting, while the Corporation gives the land 

 and pays the recurring annual expenses of management and 

 taxes. In this partnership the produce of the forest will 

 be ultimately divided between the two parties in the pro- 

 portion of the capital invested by each. In this way the 

 profit or loss accruing from the plantation will be fairly 

 shared between the State and the Corporation. Afforesta- 

 tion should be imposed as a necessary duty on all the water 

 authorities who obtain their supply from gathering grounds ; 

 in other words, each corporation ought to be compelled to 

 carry out a planting scheme as soon as the Government 

 shall issue a loan for the initial expenses of planting. The 

 Forestry Board, that we hope to see established on the 

 conclusion of peace, would prepare a working plan in each 

 case, which ought to be systematically carried out, careful 

 records being made of expenses and receipts. 



Since this was written the Forestry Sub-Committee of 

 the Reconstruction Committee have issued their Report, and 

 have made a very definite pronouncement concerning the 

 areas from which water supplies are collected by local 

 authorities. " We consider it should be an invariable rule 

 that on catchment areas all land which will produce a crop 

 of marketable timber should be afforested. Many of the 

 corporations are still engaged in meeting the capital outlay 

 which their water supply systems necessitated, and for that 



