PROJECTED TIMBER SUPPLIES 197 LEVEL OF MANAGEMENT 



43 



and by the forest industries for logging operations 

 and forest administration. Expenditures for roads 

 on National Forests in 1970, for example, totaled 

 about $180 million (plus $112 million of timber 

 purchaser construction and maintenance). Sub- 

 stantial outlays for roads were also made on other 

 Federal and State forest lands, on those portions 

 of the Federal, State, and county highway systems 

 that have local impacts on forestry activities, and 

 on private forest holdings. 



General administration of forestry operations 

 of both public and private forest owners and 

 forestry agencies involve additional expenditures 

 that have not been evaluated in this study. 



Tax provisions of the Federal and State Gov- 

 ernments include certain financial benefits to 

 owners of timber properties. Thus the Internal 

 Revenue Code generally permits treatment of 

 income from the sale and cutting of timber as 

 capital gains rather than as ordinary income and 

 this is believed to have been a significant induce- 

 ment to invest in planting and other forestry 

 practices. 



Some 35 States have enacted special forest 

 tax laws to modify State and local property taxa- 

 tion of forest lands and timber in order to encour- 

 age improved forest management. However, most 

 of these special laws have been of relatively 

 limited application. 



FOREST AREA ASSUMPTIONS FOR 

 PROJECTIONS 



Over the past several decades additions to the 

 area of commercial timberland in the United 

 States exceeded losses, with a resulting rise in the 

 area of commercial timberland to about 508 million 

 acres around the year 1962 (table 30). Gains in 

 forest areas were largely the result of natural or 

 artificial reseeding of abandoned farm lands. 

 Losses of forest land stemmed from a wide variety 



of changes in land use, including withdrawals of 

 land for parks and other recreation areas, urban 

 development, cropland expansion, highways, res- 

 ervoirs, and other nontimber uses. 



During the 1960's the upward trend in com- 

 mercial timberland area was reversed. More and 

 more private forest properties have been acquired 

 and developed for second homes or other recrea- 

 tional uses. Public lands have been withdrawn and 

 other areas acquired from private owners for 

 public recreation use. Throughout the country 

 forest lands have been engulfed by urban sprawl. 

 Extensive areas have also been cleared for agri- 

 culture, whereas additions to forest land from 

 abandoned crop and pasture lands have been 

 declining. 



It has been assumed in developing the supply 

 projections shown in this chapter that the area 

 of commercial timberland will continue to de- 

 cline over the 1970-2020 period by roughly 5 

 million acres per decade — or a 5 percent reduction 

 for the 50-year period (table 30). Rates of area 

 reductions were assumed to differ somewhat by 

 region and by ownership. 



These projections of commercial timberland 

 areas are intended only as reasonable possibilities 

 of future changes. With different area assump- 

 tions, projections of timber supplies could be 

 roughly adjusted by applying the same percentage 

 change to both area and supply projections. 



In the case of National Forests and other public 

 lands, it is quite possible that some additional 

 areas beyond a 5 percent reduction as shown in 

 table 31 may be removed from the timber supply 

 base in the future. After the 1970 compilation 

 was completed certain areas were selected for 

 study as possible additions to the wilderness sys- 

 tem, and some or all of these could be perma- 

 nently reserved from cutting. These include some 

 11 million acres of the 56 million acres of roadless 

 areas in the National Forests. Environmental 



Table 30. — Area of commercial timberland in the United States, by section, 1952, 1962, and 1970, with 



■projections to 2020 



[Million acres] 



Section 



1952 



1962 



1970 



Projections 





1980 



1990 



2000 



2020 



North . 



South . ___ . . .. 



170. 2 



192. 1 



63.9 



68.8 



175. 1 



199. 9 



64. 6 



68. 5 



177. 9 

 192. 5 



1 61. 6 



2 67. 6 



176. 3 



191. 1 



60. 5 



66. 5 



174. 7 



189. 7 



59. 3 



65.5 



173. 1 



188.3 

 58. 3 

 64. 7 



169.8 

 185. 5 



Rocky Mountains- 



56. 



Pacific Coast 



63. 4 







Total United States __ 



495. 



508. 1 



499. 7 



494.4 



489. 2 



484. 4 



474. 7 







1 Includes 5 million acres of National Forest land in the 

 Rocky Mountains not considered in projecting timber 

 supplies. These include small patches and stringers of 

 productive forest land isolated from markets, areas too 



unstable to harvest with current technology, and lands 

 where nontimber uses predominate. 



2 Includes 1.1 million acres in Hawaii not considered in 

 projecting timber supplies. 



