1909.] 



Report on Afforestation. 



857 



class of unemployed who are capable of being trained to perform this 

 or the higher class of labour, and such men can, if desired, be recruited 

 through labour colonies, distress committees, labour bureaux, or 

 charitable agencies. There is, then, no need to accept inefficient labour 

 with the object of affording occupation to the unemployed. The labour 

 employed in the national forests should not fall below the ordinary 

 standards, and should be remunerated at the ordinary rate of the district 

 for similar labour. Subject to the requisite standard of efficiency being 

 attained, preference should be given to those temporarily or perma- 

 nently unemployed in the district, especially where evidence of such 

 efficiency can be furnished by public or private agencies for the 

 reclamation and training of the unemployed class. 



To establish afforestation on commercial lines does not, however, 

 preclude its being used as an instrument of social regeneration. A 

 broad view of economics cannot exclude from its cognisance the grave 

 national charge which unemployment with all its concomitant results 

 involves, to say nothing of the personal deterioration by which it is 

 often accompanied. Sylviculture is not unsuitable for building up the 

 moral and physical fibre of even the most depressed of the unemployed 

 classes, and its agency may well be invoked for this purpose, and 

 advantage taken of its healthy and wholesome influences, provided that 

 any additional expense incurred by the employment of less efficient 

 labour be defrayed from a separate account. 



In estimating the amount of employment furnished by afforestation, 

 it is well to distinguish between the temporary labour involved in the 

 creation of the forest and the permanent labour needed for its main- 

 tenance. Taking varying circumstances into consideration, it may be 

 said that, on the average, it will take twelve men to afforest 100 acres 

 in the planting season of four to five months, and that every 100 acres 

 afforested will provide permanent employment for at least one man. 

 If 150,000 acres be annually taken in hand, the labour of 18,000 men 

 will be needed, and permanent employment will in due course be afforded 

 to 1,500 men, rising by an additional 1,500 every year until the end 

 of the rotation. The number permanently employed would then 

 approach 100,000. The labour absorbed by felling and converting 

 timber, to say nothing of subsidiary industries which spring up around 

 a timber supply, has been considered too remote to warrant detailed 

 estimation, but there is undoubtedly a larg-e field of employment in 

 this connection. It is important to remember that, on the basis of 

 ;6 1,000,000 being annually spent on the operations of afforestation, apart 

 from the cost of the land, employment would be afforded, directly and 

 indirectly, to many more than 18,000 men. Indeed, the number 

 employed may be roughly taken to be represented by about double that 

 figure, for the incidental occupations, such as building, the making 

 of implements, the provision of materials, etc., all involve the employ- 

 ment of additional labour. 



Effect on Existing Industry and Agriculture.- — A special advantage 

 of forestry in relation to labour is that it offers a new source of 

 employment. The labour connected with timber and timber products 

 imported into the country is performed abroad, and thousands of 

 families are maintained on the produce of the labour associated with 

 the timber industry. Another advantage bound up with the extension 

 of sylviculture is that the market for its produce is so great that it 

 is inconceivable that it could seriously interfere with the output from 



3 I 



