STATE AFFORESTATION.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 251, 22 October 1926, Page 8

STATE AFFORESTATION.

COSTLY BLUNDERS.

TAXPAYERS' MONEY WASTED.

HOW NEW ZEALAND SUFFERS.

Writing on the subject of State alforestation, Mr. E. Maxwell, of Opunake, says:— The fetish of low first costs —of confining afforestation to poor or lowpriced land, no matter where situated, and making low first costs, both of land and planting, the first and all-important consideration —has doubtless a strong hold upon the minds of many politicians and of the public, and, extraordinary as it may seem, the Forest Service apparently blindly worshipped the same fetish. This "being the case, it is well to elucidate the position, and towards that end the first thing is to set out a reasonable definition of forestry and its objects, viz.: The art and practice of growing at the lowest cost, as near as possible to the place where the products are required, the largest quantity of wood or timber of a quality and class that will reasonably serve the special requirements upon_ a given area in the Bhortest period of time.

Whilst private plantations have proved highly profitable, and the work done by them has been commended by foresters of standing, the fact that in the twenty-ninth year of State afforestation operations the paltry sum of £114 was the gross amount that was received from timber sales from plantations, now nearly 80,000 acres in extent, and which stand in debt somewhere about one million and a-half sterling, and that the gross total received up to date from the same source is under £4000, a sum that could easily be netted in the same time from ten acres of private plantation, calls for the fullest investigation.

Planting commenced in 1896, long before the present Director of State Forestry took charge. By 1909 11,093 acres had been planted with 33,092,637 trees, equal to 2083 trees per acre, at a cost oi about £5 per 1000 trees, and by the end of 1913 20,634 acres had been planted, holding 49,284,280 trees, an average of 2388 trees per acre, as against the 2953 per acre of four years before, although nearly 12,000,000 plants had been used to replace failures —22 per cent

Some Startling Figures. The following gives the number in 1909, 'and again in 1913, of nine out of fifty species of trees which have been planted, also the decrease between the two periods:— 1909. 191.% Decrease. Austrian pine 3,769,431 3,389,995 379,436 As£ .... 586,170 584,825 1,345 Sycamore .. 525,247 303,007 222,240 Walnut .... 79,027 46,880 32,147 Oaks 2,042,745 369,525 1,673,220 Jtotinia PseudoAcacia (white pr'kly Ac'ia) 161.500 29,450 132,350 Silver Birch 252,710 224,415 28,295 Catalpa 2,196,544 27 2,196,517 Totara .... 546,700 — 546,700 10,160,374 4,948,124 5,212,950 It will be seen from the foregoing that, taking those nine kinds of trees, of which there was a total of over ten millions in 1909, only under five million remained in 1913; 5,212,950, being well over half the number, had disappeared by 1913. although nearly twelve million plants had been used to replace failures in the plantations. This 5,212,950 had cost about £26,000, which by now represents an accumulated debit of aoout £71,000, with nothing, absolutely nothing, left to show for it. Just imagine the State in a State afforestation scheme planting' over half a million sycamores, and about the same number of ash, 250,000 silver birch, 79,000 walnuts, over two million oaks, and 161,000 prickly acacias (so-called), little better than a noxious weed!

But, bad as these were, they are nothing to the planting of two million odd catalpas! Ho wonder the 2,169,544 of 1909 had all but twenty-seven vanished by 1913, and so vanished with them about another £11,000 of the taxpayers' money in first cost, which by now would equal about £30,000 of accumulated debit.

And last of this list, and by no means all, comes the half million totara which by 1913 had all vanished from the State plantations," but unfortunately tliat was not the last of them, for a number were palmed ofi on farmers.

What Forestry Consists of. 'Torestry doe 3 not consist of being able to report that so many thousands of acres oi land have been planted somewhere and somehow," said Mr. Maxwell. He then goes on to criticise the methods which have been adopted. "Whilst the planting in this country in proper locations and under a proper selection of gums for the production of hardwood timber, pinus insignia for case and building timber, and redwood for superior building and finishing timber, would be a sure solution of the timber problem, and a sound financial proposition," continued Mr. Maxwell, "the planting of some kinds of trees that are being recommended to forestry companies and others, and presumably being planted by the State, are assured of financial failure under the system of planting and in the locations selected." In addition to other reasons for failure, lie said that the establishment costs, maintenance and overhead charges and interest thereon, would accumulate over the long rotation periods necessary, so that the timber produced would have to reach practically an impossible value to bear them. The primary and vital blunder otf wrong location, which was not only not being avoided, but was being accentuated, made financial and economic failure doubly certain, because it made any early returns or alleviation of maintenance and other costs impossible, and so imposed accumulation of all charges on the main crop. How disastrous this is, especially when the rotation periods were overlong, could be seen at a glance at the following figures: First costs, maintenance, and overhead charges, compounded at 5 per cent on rotation of 80 years—£9Bo per acre. Compared with: First costs, maintenance and overhead charges and costs of early thinnings, compounded at 5 per cent on rotation of 40 years—£lso per acre.

Certain kinds of trees which were being planted required the longer period, and the £980 per acre accumulated charge would impose a debit against the stumpage on a 50,000 superficial feet crop, which would be about the net yield of such trees, of about £2 per 100 sup. feet, and, due to remote location, about another 6/ per 100 ft excess haulage would have to be borne—£2 6/ per 100 ft in addition to all milling, handling, haulage to mill, haulage to railway, haulage from railway, and sale costs! Concluding his remarks, Mr. Maxwell says: "It is of the utmost importance in the interests oif the service that it should continue and direct all public and 1 private afforestation and all tree plant- _ "Sv* 0 -* 1 " 1 * tner e would be no free com--1 petition and no embarrassing contracts."