52 BULLETIN" 354, U. S. DEPARTMENT OE AGRICULTURE. 



not only cares for their vast resources, but is undertaking the reforest- 

 ing of the grassy wastes which have resulted from the same destruc- 

 tive agricultural practices that have devastated the Porto Rican 

 forests, "conuco" cultivation. Hawaii for the last 10 years has 

 maintained an active forest organization which has given special 

 attention to watershed protection, and, although one-fourth of the 

 total land area is still forested and largely permanently reserved 

 and carefully protected, has done much forest planting besides. In 

 fact, forest planting has been carried on by private enterprise in 

 Hawaii for nearly a generation. 



There is no country of all of these more favorably situated than 

 Porto Rico to undertake the practice of forestry. Local market 

 conditions can hardly be equaled anywhere. The forest soils are 

 generally well isolated, and well and centrally located, and are thus 

 admirably adapted to serve easily and at a minimum of expense 

 the general needs of the surrounding population, at the same time 

 affording protection to the headwaters of the more than a thousand 

 streams of the island. 



Needed Legislation. 1 



Laws concerning the forests and trees are no new thing to Porto 

 Rico. Mention has previously been made of the early land laws, 

 which required tree planting as a condition of the grant; of the 

 "Law of Waters," providing for the study of the watersheds which 

 it was advisable to keep wooded; of the "regulations" of 1879 

 concerning public works, which provided an apparently elaborate 

 forest administration intrusted with "the inspection of forests for 

 the formation of plans for their use"; and lastly to the provision in 

 the Political Code of 1902 for a "chief of lands and forests." It is 

 not known that these various works and officials ever existed except 

 on paper, but certainly no tangible results from them have come 

 down to the present day. 



More recently, by the act of March 9, 1911, the legislative assem- 

 bly created a Board of Commissioners of Agriculture 2 which has 

 interested itself in forestry. The supervisory machinery is thus 

 already in existence and its interest in the work already aroused. 



1 A forestry law was drafted along the lines discussed in these pages for inclusion herein as anappendix. 

 It was, however, omitted as the bulletin was going to press and referred instead to the committee recently 

 created by joint resolution [J. R. No. 3, approved April 3, 1916] of the legislative assembly "for the study 

 of the forestry needs of Porto Rico." This committee is composed of the President of the Board of Com- 

 missioners of Agriculture, the Commissioner of the Interior, the Commissioner of Education, and the 

 Special Agent in Charge of the Porto Rico Agricultural Experiment Station at Mayaguez. 



2 The president ex officio is a head of department designated by the governor. Of the other six members 

 one must be a member of the House of Delegates and be designated by the speaker, while each of the 

 commercial associations — Associacion de Puerto Rico, Associacion de Productores de Azucar, Associacion 

 de Productores de Cafe, Associacion de Productores de Tabaco, and Associacion de Productores de Frutas— 

 nominate, one of the five remaining commissioners, 



