22 



reserved forests now comprise 9.5 per cent of the state forests. In the 

 course of time, it is expected, they will comprise at least 15 per cent 

 of the total area of British India. The value of forest products 

 annually exported is over $144,000,000. The annual net revenue from 

 the State forests has risen in forty years from $240,000 to $3,300,000. 



The coming of forestry in India was the result of peculiar local 

 conditions which differed in many respects from those of older forest 

 countries. Among these were the practically complete dependence 

 of the people upon wood, the aggravated wastefulness of forest cut- 

 ting, and a shortage of the teak wood required -for the British public 

 works at Bombay and other places. Many difficulties beset the way 

 of reform when reform was forced upon the government. The 

 ignorance and wastefulness of the natives, the destructive popular 

 rights to the use of thp forests for wood and jDasture Avhich had 

 grown up during the ages under loose native administration, and the 

 lack of a central authority strong enough to enforce regulation, all 

 helped to make the situation a difficult one. Yet the Indian forest 

 service is one of the most efficient in the world. The right of the 

 State to intervene for the general welfare by protecting and develop- 

 ing the forest has been clearly recognized and successfully applied. 

 This is the reverse of the case in Great Britain. 



In the size of the country, the variety of the climates, the old habits 

 of forest waste, the damage done by fire, the existence of arid regions 

 and deserts, the problem of floods, the importance of grazing, the 

 possibilities of irrigation, and, finally, the extent of the national for- 

 ests (India 149,000,000 acres, the United States 160,000,000 acres), 

 Indian forestry has broad lines of resemblance to forestry in the 

 United States. Of the cultivated acreage 30,000,000 acres depend 

 upon irrigation. But the differences between the conditions in the 

 two countries are no less striking. The backward industrial stage 

 of India, the fact that TO per cent of its population are engaged in 

 agriculture, its lack of available coal and the consequent dependence 

 of the people upon wood for fuel, and the exceptional character of its 

 forest products, clearly indicate that progress in forestry can not 

 move so rapidly there as here. 



Great areas must be kept under forest in India in order to supply 

 local demands. Although the coast line is long, the country is so 

 large that wood importations would generally involve very long 

 hauls, which would greatly add to the cost of wood. In this re- 

 spect the railway has not brought the changes which have followed it 

 in other countries. Instead of carrying in foreign wood to supply 

 home production the railways have themselves made fresh demands 

 for local construction material, and instead of carrjdng in new fuel 

 they have in many cases drawn upon local wood for their own fuel. 

 Iron mines are not conveniently located, so that wood must long con- 



[Cir. 140] 



