18 
Second, these lands are not now generally be- 
ing managed under any reasonable level of pro- 
fessional forest management. They are the only 
major ownership class that is not--the others 
being industrial private, State and other public, 
and Federal. 
Third, when nonindustrial landowners avail 
themselves of technical assistance, they are 
better off financially, the timber resource is left in 
better condition, and investments in improved 
growth are made. The job is primarily one of 
selling the advantage of getting professional 
forestry assistance to landowners. 
Fourth, the data show that the difficulty of ad- 
dressing the nonindustrial problem may not be 
quite as great as often assumed. That is be- 
cause most of the opportunities are on the larg- 
er ownerships held by relatively few landown- 
ers. 
--A whopping 60 percent or more of the total 
economic opportunities to increase growth in 
the South are on nonindustrial private owner- 
ships greater than 100 acres in size. 
--These owners have the greatest economic in- 
centives to invest and are /east likely to have 
ownership objectives incompatible with timber 
production. 
--There are only 275,000 of these owners 
Southwide--as compared to 3.5 million total 
owners--that's only 8 percent of the total. 
--With only 275,000 of the larger owners, spread 
out Southwide, and only a portion of them mak- 
ing harvest decisions in any year, we ought 
somehow to be able to marshal our collective 
resources to get to them more effectively than 
we have been able to so far. 
Fifth, the problem of addressing the nonindus- 
trial issue is a multifaceted one in which all 
forestry interests have a part. Forestry consult- 
ants have a key role with the larger landowners. 
State service foresters also have a key role--to 
provide assistance to the many and important 
smaller landowners, and to be present to help 
the owners of forest holdings of all sizes to un- 
derstand that it is in their economic self-interest 
to get professional assistance. State service 
foresters can also alert larger landowners to the 
services of forestry consultants. Extension has 
an important role as well, in alerting all forest 
landowners to the importance of getting profes- 
sional help. So do the other Federal agencies 
and the forest industry. A key element in any 
approach to capturing oportunities to increase 
timber growth must be the establishment of for- 
mal and informal institutional relationships at 
the State and local level. The purpose of such 
institutional relationships would be to coordi- 
nate the efforts of all forestry interests to assure 
that forest landowners are apprised of manage- 
ment and investment opportunities before tim- 
ber harvest commences. 
e Sixth, some States have been more successful 
than others in capturing the opportunity pre- 
sented by private forest owners. Virginia, for 
example, is regenerating three-quarters of its 
harvested area to pine, as opposed to the one- 
third that is common in many other Southern 
States. If that performance were to be trans- 
ferred to other States, our problems would be 
significantly diminished. States like Virginia 
show that the job can be done. 
@ Seventh, we need to develop State-level perfor- 
mance goals. Goals should not be just for the 
number of landowners contacted. Targets 
should be for acres successfully regenerated 
after harvest, for timber-stand improvement ac- 
complished, and similar concrete measures of 
performance and investments made out on the 
ground. The data from the South's fourth forest 
report could form the basis for such State-level 
goals. 
The bottom line is that significant low-risk, high- 
payoff opportunities exist to increase timber sup- 
plies in the South. Capturing these opportunities will 
pay large dividends for regional economic develop- 
ment and jobs, for the national welfare, and for the 
environment. Whether these opportunities are real- 
ized depends on the leadership of State policy offi- 
cials and on how well the various forestry interests 
work together to achieve it. The key to success is 
not massive programs or budgets, but good com- 
munication and cooperation among all interests. 
The Federal Government will do its part as evi- 
denced by existing programs, and by research 
efforts such as those done to support "The South's 
Fourth Forest" report. But a large part of the respon- 
