EMPLOYMENT AND FORESTRY.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 243, 14 October 1929, Page 6

EMPLOYMENT AND FORESTRY.

One of the most interesting sections of the report on Unemployment submitted to Parliament last- week deals with Afforestation as a means of providing work for the workless. Taking as its starting-point the indisputable fact that the demand for softwoods is increasing everywhere far more rapidly than the supply, and the rapid decline of our own indigenous forests, the Report, without committing itself unconditionally to a policy of Afforestation, suggests that there are great possibilities for development in this- direction. The extremely rapid growth of exotic softwoods in this country should enable us to supply our future needs if we take warning m time; while the possibilities of the wood-pulp industry and the utilisation of by-products open up prospects of remarkable interest and value. But apart from these latter considerations, the work of planting and thinning alone would provide employment for a very laige number of hands for a long time to come, if our Forestry programme were expanded on a generous scale, and this means of relief is certainly one of the most effective remedies that the Commission has suggested for Unemployment.