The Forests Commission.

Progress, Volume IV, Issue 6, 1 April 1909, Page 187

The Forests Commission.

Many things are expected of the Royal Commission that is to consider the Forest question of this Dominion in all its many aspects. Two things, however, stand out of the ruck of them with special interest. The Commission is expected to say much of the proper manner of helping the timber industry, and to remember the question of the protection of that native industry. But these are matters subsidiary. The two main points of interest are the supply of the timber of all kinds in the Dominion, how fast it is being consumed, and how long it may be reasonably expected to last : and the conservation of forests in certain areas marked by nature as especially favourable for the growth of timber. With the first is associated the question of afforestation for climatic and other reasons; and with the second is allied the question of asserting the superiority of the forest to the settlement that seeks to uproot trees in places where nothing but trees will ever

grow. The neglect of these matters in the past has caused loss, and the continuation cf that neglect will be the occasion of disaster. The Department of Lands has already broken ground about the timber supply, and estimated its endurance, making it no more than a century at the most, and probably less by twenty-five per cent. This point the Commission is expected by the Dominion to examine closely and report upon exhaustively. The other point, that of the destruction of forests where forests ought to be conserved, is being illustrated forcibly just now by the eruptions of the Mountain Ngaruhoe. These remind us that vast quantities of pumice are scattered over the forests round the feet of the volcanic regions of the centre of the North Island and make us suspect that when the timber gives way to the settler, the settler may be drijven forth ruined by the barrenness of the soil. The point has been raised before. It is for the Commission to settle it once for all.