84 FORESTRY IN GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. 



general consumption also began to fail, and, above all, the require- 

 ments of timber necessary for an efficient conduct of the war 

 assumed gigantic proportions. The submarine warfare interfered 

 more and more with the imports of timber, especially from the 

 Baltic. They reached in 1915 only 75 per cent, of those before 

 the war, and sank to 63 per cent, in 1916. At the same time, 

 prices rose enormously, so that the country had to pay £37,000,000 

 more for the wood imports during those two years than it would 

 have paid before the war. 



In the meantime the quantity of available shipping had rapidly 

 decreased, and every possible step to increase the tonnage had to 

 be taken. As the imports of timber required some 6 million tons 

 annually, a quantity approximately equal to that required for the 

 import of grain, it was decided, in January, 1917, to prohibit the 

 import of timber except by Kcence, to obtain the timber required 

 for home consumption chiefly from British woods, and that for 

 the conduct of the war, as far as possible, from French forests. 

 A timber supply department was established in France, and the 

 home timber supply department thoroughly organised and 

 considerably enlarged. Canadian lumbermen were obtained, men 

 not fit for general service were transferred to forestry battalions, 

 sawmills were hired and bought. The transport of the material 

 presented great difficvilt}^ ; there were no horses available, and 

 mechanical traction difficult to obtain, owing to the large demand 

 for military purposes ; nor were the roads in many parts of the 

 country sufficiently solid to bear the heavy traffic. The war 

 found the home timber market in an unorganised condition 

 and unable to meet efficiently the sudden demands made upon it. 



3. Necessity of an Adequate Forest Policy. 

 What has been said so far justifies the following conclusions : — 



(1) The supply of home-grown timber is altogether insufficient 



to meet, even in times of peace, the ever-increasing 

 requirements. 



(2) The supply of imported timber in the future is uncertain, 



and this is a grave source of weakness in time of war or 

 any other emergency. 



(3) Afforestation would increase the productiveness of large 



areas of land in the country, which are now little more 



