although her own supply of operable timber is 
diminishing. For 30 years or more the United 
States has imported more wood and wood products 
than it has exported. It can no longer rely as 
much on imports as in the past. ‘The Nation must 
look mainly to its own forests. 
9. The forest situation, therefore, poses a dilem- 
ma. ‘The intrinsic needs of this country for saw- 
timber products are considerably greater than the 
present cut. Yet saw-timber drain already exceeds 
annual growth. To increase current output im- 
plies accelerating timber depletion and so hasten- 
ing the day when drastic reduction in the use of 
timber products would be inescapable. To cur- 
tail output now so as to facilitate building up 
growing stock and annual growth would leave 
urgent needs (such as that for more housing) un- 
filled and might weaken the foundation for a high- 
level national economy. ‘There is no wholly satis- 
factory way out. 
The Nation should adopt a broader and more 
positive forest conservation program than has ex- 
isted in the past. We need to stop forest destruc- 
tion and deterioration, to put idle forest land to 
work, and to obtain widespread adoption of sus- 
tained-yield forest management in order to assure 
ample supplies of timber products for future gen- 
erations. But to meet the pressing demands of 
the years just ahead, we should strive to keep na- 
tional output of timber products from falling much 
below present levels, if possible. 
10. More efficient use of wood can help bridge 
the gap though it cannot decisively relieve the 
pressure on growing stock. Wood waste—material 
from the forest which is not used for marketable 
products other than fuel—was estimated at 109 mil- 
lion tons for 1944, or over half of all timber cut. 
This waste can be reduced through more efficient 
logging and manufacturing; and by improved 
chemical recovery such as the processes for making 
alcohol from sawmill and pulping wastes. How- 
ever, economic use cannot be made of all or even 
most of the wood now wasted. Opportunities are 
principally in the South and Pacific Northwest, 
where there are large primary plants and large 
usable concentrations of wood waste. Even though 
the use of wood waste will not greatly affect forest 
drain or alter requirements as visualized in the 
long-range growth goal, it can help meet current 
needs for wood and is important for other reasons. 
It strengthens the incentive for better and more 
diversified forestry. New uses for wood waste 
also serve to expand employment and industrializa- 
tion, and hence should help cushion the effects 
of forest depletion on dependent communities. 
11. Increasing the cut of virgin timber in the 
West would relieve the pressure on the growing 
stocks of the East. Clearly, eastern forests are not 
in condition to go on bearing over 60 percent of 
the country’s saw-timber drain. Some reduction 
of output appears inevitable. Good forest prac- 
tices can hold this reduction to perhaps 15 or 20 
percent, but even so, the growing stock would 
need to be built up for 20 or 30 years before output 
could be safely restored. 
To help maintain national output, the cut of 
virgin timber in the West could be increased for a 
number of years. But this should not be at the 
expense of good forest practice. Operations should 
be properly located and cutting practices adapted 
to maintain forest productivity in each locality. 
Because of such considerations an increase of west- 
ern output hinges largely on rapid construction of 
access roads into undeveloped country, particularly 
in the national forests. 
12. More than 30 percent of the Nation’s saw 
timber is in the national forests. Because private 
lands have been generally more accessible, a large 
part of the virgin timber still awaiting development 
is in the western national forests. It is largely to 
these forests that the Nation must look to minimize 
a prospective decline elsewhere in the output of 
timber products. To bring the output of all the 
national forests up to their sustained-yield capacity 
calls for more intensive management as well as 
a large road-building program. ‘Timber sales need 
to be speeeded up; more of the output should be 
from thinnings and other improvement measures 
in growing forests. Denuded areas should be 
planted. Better protection and more adequate 
administrative facilities should be provided. But 
output, working circle by working circle, should not 
be allowed to exceed sustained-yield capacity. 
We can also turn to the national forests of Alaska, 
whose resources are as yet untapped on a large 
scale. Alaska’s timber will be chiefly valuable to 
supplement our pulpwood supply. When the pulp 
and paper industry becomes established in Alaska 
it should be able to supply about 7 percent of the 
Nation’s potential pulp and paper requirements— 
representing a cut of about 114 million cords of 
pulpwood annually. We should make the most 
of this opportunity. 
13. But this country’s forest problem centers 
4 Miscellaneous Publication 668, U. S. Department of Agriculture 
