General
Fundamental science
Silviculture and management
Forest protection
Logging and engineering
Conversion
Utilization
Economics and statistics
Policy, legislation and administration
Personalities
Reviews
The items appearing here are condensed selections of news thought to be of interest to readers of UNASYLVA. They are grouped alphabetically by countries under headings currently used by the Division of Forestry and Forest Products for reference purposes. The Editor will be glad to receive direct from readers authenticated items of interest and news value for this part of the review.
ARGENTINA
· The second major congress of the Federation of Associations of Forestry Industry Producers of the Argentine Republic was opened 9 October 1948 at Santiago del Estero. Among the questions discussed were the following: 1) The production of new, improved types of fuel; 2) problems relating to the quebracho tree; 3) reforestation and afforestation, means of facilitating action on the part of private owners; 4) the proposed establishment of an Institute of Forest Technology; 5) measures for the improvement of living conditions for forest workers and their families.
DENMARK
· The Danish Forestry Society and the Directorate of State Forests in Denmark have established an instruction school for forest workers. Forest owners pay the transportation expenses and the normal salary for workers attending the school, while the Government provides lodging and instructors. Each course is of about one month duration.
FINLAND
· An institute of forest genetics has been founded to promote specialized studies in this field. The institute will base its work on experience acquired in North America, Denmark, and Sweden. A forest survey will be made to locate selected trees and stands from which seeds can be collected. The necessary personnel, buildings, and nurseries have already been placed at the disposal of the new organization. The institute is to be directed by a committee including the Director of State Forests, agricultural experts, sawmill managers, plywood and paper manufacturers, etc.
HUNGARY
· The forest area of Hungary, which covers 10 percent of the total area of the country, amounts to 1.2 million hectares. Up to now 74 percent of the forests have been nationalized, while the remainder belongs either to communities or to private individuals. The responsibility for the exploitation, reforestation, and cultivation of these forests is entrusted to a company (Mallerd) which still enjoys some autonomy although it belongs to the State. During the war, Hungarian forests were seriously overcut. Normally, cutting should not exceed 1.5 million m³ ®, of which 6 percent are softwoods, 31 percent oak, and 63 percent beech and other hardwoods. During 1944 and 1945 9 million ins ® were cut; in 1947 it appears that 3.7 million m³ ® were cut of which 0.9 million m³ ® were for lumber and 2.8 million m³ ® for firewood. Present-day requirements are said to amount to 6.7 million m³ ®, one-half of which is lumber.
MADAGASCAR
· The Division of Forestry Education has been created as a part of the Central Service of Waters and Forests at Tananarive. Among other responsibilities, this division is entrusted with the direction of the forestry school at Angavokely, where students are admitted after a competitive examination; 10 to 15 students graduate each year. After their final examination these students are qualified as forest rangers. The course, which takes one year, includes seven months of field training in the forests on the eastern coast.
RUMANIA
· The Institute of Forestry Research in Rumania, founded in 1933, has had a revised constitution since 5 June 1947. Under a new law, the Institute has been reorganized and its scope enlarged to include science, education and propaganda, administration, and co-operation with agriculture. It has been divided into eight scientific divisions: silviculture and exploitation; botany, ecology, genetics, and pathology; protection of forests and game; forest pedology; forest management; technology and industrial use of wood and other forest products; construction and logging; forest policies, economics and administration, and research programs. These divisions are further subdivided and have the necessary laboratories. The Institute has six forest experiment stations in various parts of the country on different kinds of land-steppe, plain, hilly, and mountainous regions.
SWEDEN
· The Swedish Forestry Association is planning a series of radio broadcasts in order to get more people interested in forestry matters, to bring about a better recognition of the importance of forestry problems in relation to the whole economy of the country, and thereby to influence the Government's forestry policy.
This is also a way to reach small forest owners, who by this kind of education may be brought to realize what improved silvicultural methods can do for their forest property.
TRINIDAD
· The Conservator of Forests, Forest Department, Port of Spain, Trinidad, has provided some further information which supersedes that appearing in the National Situations report contained in UNASYLVA, Vol. II, No. 1. He reports that state forests cover 247,000 hectares, of which only about 1,200, in the catchment area of a large reservoir, are closed to exploitation. The 14,206 hectares referred to in the earlier report as a 'national domain where no exploitation is allowed' undoubtedly comprise the lands leased to the U.S.A. for 99 years as a defense base. The fate of these lands rests in the hands of the U. S. authorities and the decision whether or not to exploit these forests is their responsibility. Inevitably, a good deal of the forest had to be cut when the bases were built.
The quantity of timber processed in the sawmills in 1945 was 36,350 cubic meters. The amount of timber handsawn in the state forests in 1945 was only 60,152 cubic feet (say 1,700 cubic meters). Pitsawing is almost dead in Trinidad, having been killed by the advent of numerous sawmills. A considerable volume of wood is annually hewn and used in the round. Imports in 1945 amounted to 1,178,800 cubic feet.
While it is true that the natural forests contain a considerable number of species with inferior timbers suitable only for fuel, Trinidad is perhaps more fortunate than many Latin American countries in being able to provide an increasing market for many of even the less durable species. Developments in crate and packing case manufacture, for example, promise a market for such usually unsalable species as Spondias monbin and Pachira insignis. The policy of the Forest Department in the past has been to concentrate regeneration operations - but not exploitation - in a limited number of forests where abundant natural regeneration of the more valuable species could be obtained at low cost and where future exploitation would be inexpensive. Similarly, the teak plantations are formed on areas of suitable soil where extraction is simple. Now that the demand for erstwhile unsalable species is rising it is planned to bring all the forests under controlled exploitation and systematic regeneration.
UNITED KINGDOM
· The first year of the 50-year plan, at the end of which Great Britain expects to possess 2 million hectares (5 million acres) under forests, showed the following results: An increase in forest area from 573,000 hectares (1,415,000 acres) to 583,000 hectares (1,441,000 acres). Area planted or reforested 10,700 hectares (26,400 acres), including 3,600 hectares (8,900 acres) in England, 5,000 hectares (12,400 acres) in Scotland, 2,100 hectares (5,100 acres) in Wales; for this purpose 54 million young trees were used, all produced by the nurseries of the Forestry Commission. The nursery area was Increased by 70 hectares (173 acres) and now totals 749 hectares (1,850 acres) with 338 million seedlings and 119 million transplants. Three new forestry schools have been opened. The Alice Holt Lodge Forest Research Station in Surrey began functioning, with divisions of silviculture, forest management, pathology, forest entomology, and a bibliographical section. The number of workers employed by the Forestry Commission increased from 6,700 in October 1946 to 10,500 in October 1947. Receipts totaled 95.5 million, and expenditures 93.9 million, leaving a credit balance of £1.6 million. The Commission has now at its disposal an amount of 93.7 million, as it already bad a previous credit balance of 92.1 million at the beginning of the fiscal year.
UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
· The belief that forests have only a minor influence upon climate is contested by Russian scientists. Their opinion is based on observations made over vast areas of European Russia and Siberia, as well as over the equally wide steppe regions. Measurements taken in a wooded area of 80,000 hectares in the province of Sumara have indicated an average annual rainfall of 475 millimeters, whereas this rainfall was reduced to 387 millimeters at 80 to 90 kilometers west of these forests, 248 millimeters at from 70 to 80 kilometers to the east, 336 millimeters at 60 kilometers to the north and 275 millimeters at from 40 to 50 kilometers south of these forests.
Because evaporation in forest areas is much greater than that from any other mass of vegetation, even greater than that of swampy regions or bodies of water, large-scale plans have been prepared to increase the area of forests in the marshy or sparsely wooded regions of the north. Extensive drainage and canalization are planned, as well as afforestation and reforestation. It is hoped that these will increase evaporation and that the moisture will be blown towards the dry steppes. Rainfall in these areas would thus increase and considerably improve the fertility of the soil. Russian scientists argue that since the climate of the steppes has deteriorated because of intensive deforestation in the North, this trend would be reversed and the climate would benefit from the effects of intensive reforestation. The deterioration of the climate in the south was evidenced by increases in variations of temperature, by protracted droughts, sandstorms, decrease of the water level in summer floods, the silting up of river beds and estuary ports. Silting is a major obstruction to navigation on the great Russian rivers. These circumstances led to the passing of a law on watershed protection in 1936. It provides that strips of land 20 kilometers wide along the upper course, 6 kilometers wide on the middle course, and 4 kilometers wide along the lower course must be protected along river banks. The forests located in this zone, covering 69 million hectares, are protected by special provisions prohibiting any cutting not primarily intended for the improvement or growth of the forest stands.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
· In a series of four lectures at the West Coast Technical Association of the Pulp and Paper Industry (TAPPI) seminar, Prof. Holger Erdtman started with a general discussion of the methods of elucidating the structure of polymeric materials and showed their possible application to the lignin structure problem. The general conclusion that may now be reached regarding lignin structure is that it is a building unit consisting of a benzene ring with a three-carbon side chain. The biggest handicap lignin chemists face in their experimental work is the difficulty of obtaining an isolated lignin that has not undergone chemical change during its isolation. The study of the lignin molecule has been aided by experimentation with closely related materials of known structure, and some simple aromatic compounds that are thought to resemble chemically the building units of lignin.
In the second lecture, the sulfonation of lignin was discussed. This reaction takes place during a sulfite cook and is one of the most characteristic lignin reactions.
The difficulty experienced in pulping the heartwood of pines by the sulphite process was the subject of the third session. Dr. Erdtman has recently unravelled the mystery of these puzzling phenomena with his discovery of the phenolic compound "pinosylvin" and its derivatives in pine heartwood. He was able to show that these materials, although occurring in small amounts, inhibit the sulphite cooking reaction.
The heartwood of Douglas fir, Pseudotsuga taxifolia, is difficult to pulp by the sulphite process due to the presence of another phenolic substance, "taxifolia." In Finland, the ultimate solution to the problem of the sulphite pulping of pines was found in the hand-sorting of heart and sapwood chips under ultraviolet light. Dr. Erdtman concluded with a discussion of other crystalline, identifiable compounds which occur in minute amounts in various woods.
UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
· Contrary to observations made by other entomologists, Soviet scientists have found that, in the Kovdosk Bay of the White Sea, the marine borer, Limnoria lignorum, produces as many as 12 to 20 (sometimes 25) eggs per female at a temperature as low as 8 to 10° C. The salinity of the water in the bay, however, is too low for the borer to attack piles and other submarine structures. Here it lives in the more saline water at greater depths (7 to 9 meters), feeding on the sunken waste from sawmills in the vicinity. It is feared that attacks may spread from these areas to marine wooden structures in places where salinity is higher.
CANADA
· Ontario's Department of Lands and Forests distributed nearly 20 million seedlings for reforestation purposes in Ontario during 1948. It has been estimated that nearly 15,500 km² (6,000 sq. mi.) of southern Ontario requires reforestation, and the provincial nurseries are hard-pressed to supply the demand from farmers, service organizations, and private individuals. Chief bottleneck is in obtaining seed for the nurseries, and the department is now using every known modern method of obtaining it. Work on reseeding of burned-over areas is still proceeding, with "pelleting" in, full swing. Pelleted seeds are coated with minerals and other substances, and are sown from the air after the first snowfall in November. However, forestry experts point out that in the north sufficient seed trees remain to reseed areas cut or burned over, and that planting of a tree for every one cut down or burned would be wasteful and inefficient.
PUERTO RICO
· Between January 1934 and June 1945 more than 2,300 hectares (5,800 acres) have been reforested. Seven million plants and 28,800 kilograms (63,600 pounds) of seeds of 30 different species were used. A general survey of the results obtained on the restocked areas was carried out recently. These operations were carried out on sites of very varied quality, including areas which had suffered considerably from erosion. The degree of soil erosion was in fact an essential factor in the success of this reforestation work. The rate of survival was low since, despite the considerable protection which natural regeneration afforded to the sowings and to the artificial plantations, only 60 percent of the area planted can now be considered completely restocked while 23 percent is only partly reforested and requires additional young trees in the gaps. The cost of these operations was very high, averaging US $67 per hectare ($27.12 per acre) for the initial planting, $18 per hectare ($7.33 per acre) for the cost of replacements and of filling gaps after the first planting, plus $80 per hectare ($32.33 per acre) for weeding, clearing, vine removing, etc. One of the most important causes of high costs and partial failures was the lack of experience of the workers employed to do the planting during the first few years; but there is no doubt that the most serious cause has been the lack of knowledge as to the ecological conditions necessary for the survival of the various species planted. However, thanks to research and to the experience acquired since, much lower costs can be expected in future.
Clearing of the abundant vines and weeds will continue to require the expenditure of large sums of money. Natural regeneration can be relied upon in these forests. Research on methods suitable to bring this about is to be developed and, if the costs of artificial regeneration cannot be kept sufficiently low, the aim is to establish mixed stands of varying ages which would make natural regeneration very much easier. In many cases, in areas where restocking is necessary, it has been found that instead of initiating plantation with precious and valuable species, it was preferable to start with robust pioneering types such as the roble, Tabebuia pallida, and the maria, Calophyllum calaba, which will form a cover under which the more valuable species can be introduced later. These two species and some types of eucalyptus have given the best results on the more difficult sites. In better soils, however, the best species have proved to be the ausubo, Mimusops nitida, one of the best lumberproducing trees on the island, and then, according to circumstances, the capa prieto, Cardia alliodora, the capa blanco, Petitia domingensis, which were successful even on poor lands, the pacana, Lucuma multiflora, and the nuez moscada, Ocotea moschata. On open ground, it is advisable to space the trees closely, i.e., at a maximum distance of 1.50 to 2.50 meters, to produce a cloud canopy as rapidly as possible. Under cover, spacing can vary from 3 to 7.50 meters. The whole area of Puerto Rico only allows for a ratio of 0.4 hectares (one acre) per inhabitant and only half of this can be under permanent cultivation, so that reforestation is important. Existing forests, however, are insufficient to meet domestic requirements.
NETHERLANDS
· Of a total area of 3,480,000 hectares in Holland, forests cover only 258,000 hectares, or 7.4 percent. During the war, to meet the fuel shortage, 30,000 hectares were cut down, so that in 1945 the forest area was reduced to 228,000 hectares. However, by the end of 1947 approximately 10,000 hectares had been restocked and the trees bordering the streets and avenues had been replanted. Trees along highways, which constitute an area of 30,000 hectares, or approximately 12 percent of the wooded area, represent a considerable proportion of the country's supply.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
· The Southern Forest Experiment Station at New Orleans (Louisiana) has published a brief report on the use of mechanical tree-planters. In 1948, this station made a comparison between a plot of slash pine, Pinus caribaea, and another of longleaf pine, Pinus palustris, on which trees had been planted both by hand and by machine. The rate of survival, which was comparatively poor for the slash pine as it had suffered from grazing cattle, was found to be 68 percent for trees planted by machine and 52 percent for trees planted by hand. Figures for the longleaf pine show that 86 percent of the trees which bad been planted by machine bad survived, compared with 89 percent of those planted by band.
· The Forest Fire Commission of the Southern States has tried for several years to acclimatize the redwood, Sequoia sempervirens, in that part of the country. Some trees which were planted about thirty years ago in Virginia have grown vigorously, and there are some fine examples of century old trees in South Carolina. The growth of redwood in these regions seems superior to that of any indigenous species except poplar. To enable these experiments to be continued the Commission has recently imported from California 3,000 sequoia seedlings to be distributed in small numbers among the members of the Commission as well as among schools and colleges in the Southern States.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA
· Natural enemies of the insect attacking forest trees often play an important role in keeping such infestations in check. A case in point was the outbreak of the green oak roller, Tortrix viridana, in Bohemia and Moravia in 1940-45 which caused much damage to oak forests. Two bugs of the genus Calocoris and Cyllocoris (family Miridae) were found to be very efficient destroyers of this insect. They feed voraciously on the caterpillars of the green oak roller and in some places destroyed as much as 40 percent of them. This natural control proved very effective in preventing the infestation from becoming epidemic.
ITALY
· An Italian scientist has developed a new means of combating the processionary moth, Thaumethopoea pityocampa Schiff, which attacks pine trees, and which often causes serious damage in Western and Southern Europe. He uses a solution of from 5 to 10 percent of paradiclorobenzene dissolved in gasoline. To collect and destroy the cocoons of this moth by hand may be practicable on very young stands, but it becomes extremely costly on older stands. The low price And ease of application of the new method should make it particularly valuable in combating this caterpillar.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
· One of the most important results of the Forest Pest Control Act of 1947 has been the improvement of methods for combating the spruce budworm, Cacoecia fumiferana, which infests at present more than 400,000 hectares (990,000 acres) of mixed stands of true fir, Abies spp., and Douglas fir, Pseudotsuga taxifolia, in the States of Oregon and Washington. Experimental sprayings with DDT in a solution of fuel oil in proportions of about 1 kilogram per 9 liters per hectare (one pound of DDT to one gallon of fuel oil per acre) from airplanes, and helicopters, between mid-June and the beginning of July, just before the worms emerge from their cocoons in the crevices of the tree trunks, proved to be particularly effective, killing 95 percent of the insects. Similar experiments were carried out against the mountain pine beetle, Dendroctonus monticolae, in southeastern Idaho and western Wyoming These tests involved the spraying of the trunks of standing trees from the ground with chemicals capable of penetrating through the bark. Two sprays were used, orthodichlorobenzene and benzene hexachloride diluted in fuel oil. The operation was carried out from the beginningof May to the beginning of July and seems to have given good results, although a positive check has not been made. Experiments were also carried out against the Black Hills beetle, Dendroctonus ponderosae, in South Dakota. The recent attack of this beetle was the worst of its kind since the disastrous epidemic early in the century, which destroyed great quantities of ponderosa pine.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA
· Two types of cable hauling systems known as "Wyssen" and "Lasso Kabel" were imported in 1946 from Switzerland into Czechoslovakia and are now being used with satisfactory results in logging operations on the State forests. Use of this equipment was found not to cause any damage to the remaining forest and is compatible with intensive silvicultural practices. The Czech foresters, on the basis of experience, have developed mathematical formulae by which they determine under what conditions such mechanized logging operations give the best results both economically and silviculturally.
UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
· The Central Timber-floating Research Institute studied floating losses over a distance of 300 kilometers on the Pola River in the northern Novgorod Province. The timber was in the water for an average of 72 days, and consisted of 31.5 percent Scots pine, Pinus sylvestris, and Norway spruce, Picea abies, sawlogs, 16.4 percent small-sized logs of the same species, 11.5 percent birch, aspen, and alder sawlogs, and 40.6 percent fuelwood of the latter three species. Eighty percent (by volume) of all the timber sinks at the booms. The jams occurring there push many logs under the water; they become water-logged and sink. The loss of birch logs cut in March and April and floated the same spring amounted to 75 percent, but when kept until the following spring before floating, the loss through sinking was only 12 percent. When the trees were cut in summer or early autumn and allowed to remain with their crowns for three days before trimming, the specific gravity of the wood was reduced, through transpiration, by 14 percent. Logs cut from such trees and floated next spring gave a sinkage loss of only 2 percent. This method of cutting logs is recommended for all hardwoods except those which, when cut in the spring or early summer, develop a brown stain. These should be logged only in late summer or autumn. Unbarked small spruce and pine timber was 14 times as liable to sink as similar logs barked and seasoned before floating. Fuelwood with decay gave three times as much sinking as undecayed. Round fuelwood of deciduous species with decay showed a sinkage loss nine times as great as that without decay, but if split in half or quarter logs, only two to four times as much. The Siberian Forest Institute, which studied the sinkage of larch sawlogs in floating, found that if the logs are completely barked the loss amounts to less than 1 percent, but if the trees are girdled before being cut the loss is as little as 0.27 percent. Of course, the suitability of the river for floating, the presence of improvement works, and so forth, may account to some extent for the difference in the losses through sinkage.
· By 1950, some 61 million m³ ® of timber is to be floated annually. To take care of such a large volume, the total length of floatable waterways is to be increased from 105,000 to 220,000 kin. Extensive river improvement work is now under way. The existing waterways are classified into five groups according to the degree of improvement required.
UNITED KINGDOM
· A completely new design of plant for the continuous production of compressed sawdust board and core material has recently been demonstrated to technical experts. Radio high frequency waves, infrared heat waves and electromagnetic vibrations are some of the devices incorporated in the plant. Sawdust and resin are fed into a hopper, mixed, heated to a specific temperature by radio waves, and then passed under pressure while the temperature is maintained by infrared waves. A continuous length of hardboard emerges and passes on to a metal table where it is automatically cut into whatever length is required. The thickness of the board ranges between 6.4 min and 19.1 mm (¼ in. and ¾ in.) and a maximum width of 1.2 in (4 ft.) is allowed for. The speed is 30 to 60 centimeters (one to two ft.) per minute, equivalent to 2.4 meters (8 ft.) per minute when produced in quantity. The manufacturers claim that six of these plants, forming a small production unit, can with very little supervision produce during 24 hours (in three 8-hour shifts) about 21 kilometers (13 mi.) of board. Experiments have been carried out during recent months with waste materials sent from different countries to determine their usefulness. Sawdust has been received from the west coast of America (fir trees), Texas and Los Angeles (red-wood), Oregon (pine), and even rice husks from Egypt. The task has been to determine the amount of resin, heating and other factors required to secure success with these materials. Regarding surface finishes, the board can be finished with paint or distemper, printed designs, wood veneers, sheet metal, laminates, resins or fabrics. Principal industries in which this board can be used are building, furniture, shipbuilding, railway coach building, road transport and aircraft. A feature of the machinery is that no presses are used. The plant cost about £15,000 to build.
UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
· Enormous quantities of wood are still being used as fuel in many industrial plants of the country. This wood for the most part is poorly seasoned. It was determined that on the average the wood contained some 55 percent moisture. The use of improperly seasoned wood necessitates burning one and a half times more wood each year than if the wood were dry. By using seasoned wood, the volume of fuelwood cut each year could be reduced by 23 percent, thus releasing some 9.6 million man hours for other work; the burden on transportation could be halved; and other economies could be effected. To obtain fuelwood that contains only 20 percent moisture, it is necessary to dry the wood under natural conditions in a shed for one year; thus each plant would require an additional year's supply of wood on hand. Since the lumber industry does not fulfill its annual quota, it would be impossible to double in one year the yearly requirements of the plants. It is proposed, therefore, to accomplish this gradually by adding each year for the next five years, 8.5 percent above the annual requirements of the plant. In this way a reserve of dry wood equivalent to one year's supply will ultimately be available.
· A Russian scientist, S. B. Henel, has experimented with impregnating wood with aromatic amins, which, he claims, may open new theoretical and practical methods of reducing its hygroscopicity. The amins used were alpha-naphtylamine, betanaphtylamine, and diphenylamine. Beech and birchwood were used in the experiments. Samples of the wood were submerged in the amins for one hour at a temperature of 130° C. The best results were obtained from betanaphtylamine. The conclusions reached were that permeating the wood of beech and birch with beta-naphtylamine reduces the moisture-absorbing capacity of the wood, by varying the conditions of experiments, to 5 and 13 percent as against 14 and 22.5 percent of the untreated wood, while the water-holding capacity is reduced to 32 percent as against 150 percent in the untreated wood; the volumetric distention due to moisture absorption is reduced 7 to 10 times and the linear distention 3 to 5 times; that impregnation of the wood with aromatic amins makes it entirely resistant to fungi; that the mechanical qualities of the wood are considerably increased; and that for these reasons the impregnation of the wood with betanaphtylamine is a very efficacious method of reducing the hygroscopicity of wood.
CANADA
· Possibility of manufacture of protein-rich feeds out of sulphite liquors from pulp plants is being studied by the British Columbia Research Council which has a highly trained staff working on every phase of industrial development. Numerous projects are now being studied, although progress on many is necessarily slow. Economic problems remain to be mastered in connection with the possible conversion of the sulphite liquors.
NORWAY
· A new product, whose trade name is Sagolit, has appeared on the Norwegian market. It is manufactured from sawdust and other wood waste by a special patented process. The waste is treated chemically and mechanically and the finished product is obtained by pressure at a very high temperature. It can be worked with the usual cabinet maker's tools. Sagolit can be used either for inside panelling or exterior roofing. It has a smooth shiny surface and is impervious to humidity. Two factories have already begun manufacturing it and others are remodeling their plant for this purpose.
· The Research Society for Norwegian wood-pulp industry is investigating the possibilities of producing "semi-pulp" from wood waste. Wood waste for such purposes would be available in the form of unbarked tree tops and branches, slabs, etc., comprising any wood not generally considered suitable for sawn timber or for the manufacture of chemical or mechanical pulp, even though waste of this type is being used now by the sulphate pulp mills. The society has authorized a committee to study available methods for the production of "semipulp," to calculate estimates, if possible, for a factory of suitable size and to survey the distribution of available wood waste.
SWEDEN
· A standard export grade for panelled and glazed wood doors, to be effective as from January 1, 1949, has been agreed to jointly by the Swedish Joinery Export Association and the Swedish Joinery Manufacturers' Association.
· Methods of introducing savings in the pulp and paper industries have been discussed in "Svensk Pappers Tidning." In the production of wood pulp and paper the costs of raw materials, especially wood, are predominant. It is therefore of major importance that the losses of wood be kept as low as possible and that the process be conducted so as to obtain maximum yield. Increased use of inferior wood for high grade pulp must be warned against. In the floating and storing of pulpwood several improvements have been introduced in recent years, resulting not only in smaller loss by sinking, decay, etc., but also in better average quality of the wood. Due to shortage of labor in the forests, it has become necessary to float logs in unbarked condition in certain districts. This is dangerous for sulphite pulpwood, as the surface layer gets impregnated by tanning substances which prevent it from becoming properly cooked, thereby causing considerable loss. Changing over from knife barkers to barking drums in the mills has resulted in pulpwood savings from 10 to 15 percent; few Swedish mills still use the old method. It is pointed out, however, that the possibilities of getting clean unbleached sulphite pulp are somewhat reduced when the surface of the log is not removed. Other types of barking machines are mentioned, for instance hydraulic barkers. Thorough wetting of the logs before friction barking considerably facilitates the removal of the bark. Modern chippers give uniform chips and smaller loss in screening and cooking. In the pulping processes, the possibilities of increasing the yield without altering the pulp quality are very limited. A certain loss of short fibers passing through thickeners, wires, etc. ought to be allowed, because these fibers consist mainly of medullary ray fibers of low color and very high resin content. Several pulp mills have special equipment for screening out such fibers, thus achieving improvement in quality both for paper pulp and dissolving pulp. Manufacturers of rayon pulp should not be too keen on trying to improve the analyses of their grades beyond what is demanded by the customer, because this would unnecessarily increase production costs and in the long run force prices upward. Another trend that should be avoided is the demand for rayon pulp with low viscosity. Making such grades means a considerable loss in yield and production capacity in the pulping process, which sooner or later will be reflected in price. It is in most cases better economy for a viscose mill to make the necessary degradation by sufficient aging of the alkali cellulose, which can be done without such loss in yield and also furnishes a cellulose with smaller polydispersity. Other raw materials are sulphur, pyrites, limestone, sodium, sulphate and lime. Burning of pyrites gives generally a better economy than sulphur, and some Swedish sulphite pulp mills have recently installed NicholsFreeman's furnaces for this purpose. The consumption of sodium sulphate has been considerably reduced at such sulphate mills which have installed Tomlinson or similar furnaces with Cottrell precipitators for their black liquor burning and also modern control instruments. Great savings in the consumption of chlorine and bleaching powder have accompanied the very important development in bleaching techniques which has taken place since 1930. Almost all Swedish mills have now changed over to multistage bleaching, and most of them take in all their chlorine as liquid, transferring part of it to bleach liquor themselves. The Swedish pulp industry lays great emphasis on efficiency, not only on account of present high production costs, but also in view of the prolonged period of severe raw materials shortage. Most mills will have to face reduced supplies of pulpwood for a long time to come, thus enhancing the importance of using every possible means of saving wood. If one percent of Sweden's present pulpwood consumption could be economized, it would represent a direct saving of more than 5 million Swedish kronor.
· A larger quantity of wood for export is expected to result from economies arising from a new lumber-saving design for wooden houses recently announced.
Three years ago H.S.B. and Svenska Trähus, two large producers of prefabricated wooden houses, formed a joint research organization known as H.S.T., which now announces the result of its research concerning the design and erection of such houses. Research has been directed to small houses, mainly with the aim of reducing the quantity of wood used for each dwelling, as well as utilizing for such purposes wood of small dimensions and inferior quality.
UNITED KINGDOM
· The rotors of the Airhorse helicopter, the first to be made in Britain with three rotors, are constructed of wood. Each rotor has three blades and every one of the nine blades has been produced as a pure monocoque component. Previously helicopter blades have been fitted with internal ribs, but those on the new machine are built on the egg-shell principle, without ribs, consequently all stresses and constructional details are contained in the outer skin. Each blade consists of 1,500 separate pieces of wood. There are two parts to each blade. The first is a leading edge of Canadian birch laminations, while the second-the skin-consists of Canadian birch with a core of African mahogany of four laminations.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
· Solving an eighty-year-old problem of the pulp industry, a new process in the manufacture of sulphite wood pulp was announced by the Weyerhaeuser Timber Company. The new method now being used at the Longview, Washington plant allows more complete utilization of Pacific Northwest timber species. Eight buildings with a total floor area of about 4100 m² (44,000 sq. ft.) house the apparatus, piping and special equipment for the process, which recovers materials formerly wasted. The development permits the company to recover from waste pulping liquors chemicals used in the production of sulphite pulp and steam and power energy from organic solids in solution. As a result, pollution resulting from waste liquors discharged into steams will be eliminated. Normally, sulphite pulp is processed by cooking wood chips with an acid produced from the action of sulphur dioxide upon limestone, in the presence of water. A ton of waste organic solids is produced as a by-product for every ton of pulp manufactured. Basically, the new process substitutes magnesium oxide for limestone by the use of specially designed equipment. Evaporation and burning of the leftover cooking liquors recovers cooking chemicals in a form which permits their reuse. The organic solids reclaimed will produce enough steam to furnish power for a large part of the recovery and pulping process. This will release sawmill waste wood, heretofore used for fuel in the sulphite mill, as raw material for the production of kraft pulp in Weyerhaeuser's new plant at Longview.
· Using a process developed by a chemical company in Cleveland, Ohio, newsprint made from specially prepared wheat straw is to be run off by the Chemical Paper Manufacturing Co. in Massachusetts. The paper is to be 100 percent straw and is expected to be four times as strong as conventional newsprint. Those who have been working on the process hope it can be made for $70 a ton.
· The pulping of southern New England hardwoods is the subject of a recent bulletin issued by the Northeastern Wood Utilization Council. The Council has been interested in the increased use of hardwood to meet the growing demand for pulp and in this report special emphasis had been placed on the oak-hickory belt, which from a pulpwood standpoint offers a practically untouched supply in New England. Pulping tests on typical mixed hardwoods, consisting of about 70 percent oak and the balance beech, birch, maple and hickory, indicate that they are especially suited for corrugated paper board, the neutral sulphite semi-chemical process being found superior to the sulphate process for this purpose. The finished paper equals or surpasses the properties of kraft paper made from southern pine. The report states that the container board branch of the industry has expanded most heavily of all branches of the industry, apparently without being able to meet the market demand, and it is believed that the potential demand is far from being saturated.
The Council has also given a good deal of attention to charcoal production, as one method of utilizing low-grade wood. Bulletins have been issued on portable cinder block kilns developed by the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, and on the continuous distillation installations which were subsequently developed. The firm of Roth and Strupp in Switzerland has carried out a further development of the distillation unit. This consists of a semi-portable unit, which may be of interest because of the small quantity of wood required and the low investment cost.
· Development of a new, low-cost board that repels rats has been announced by a company which is now producing a material known as Protekwood that promises to reduce substantially the damage by rats to food, property and human life. This new easily-applied laminated board, a combination of hardwood veneer with impregnated fiber facers, is non-poisonous and in no way effects poultry or farm animals.
Recent tests indicated the value of Protekwood. Boxes made of ordinary wood and others made of Protekwood were placed in cages and a farm rat put in each cage. The rats had access to water, but the only food they could get was in the boxes. In every case the rats seeking to get the food from the Protekwood boxes were repelled. The Protekwood boxes were barely scratched by the teeth of the rats. But the rats actively attacked the plain wooden boxes.
UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
· Present rate of dry distillation of hardwood does not keep pace with the increasing demand for acetic acid in USSR, and the expansion of this industry is looked upon as uneconomical because it would entail the use of large quantities of timber too valuable for that purpose, Russian research turned, therefore, to other possible sources of acetic acid, especially to the large potential source offered by the manufacture of industrial gas from wood. A recovery process has now been worked out and introduced into one of the largest wood-gas plants. It was found that by this method, acetic acid can be produced twice is cheaply as by dry distillation of hardwoods, and that high yields can be obtained also from coniferous wood. The gas is dried at the same time as the acetic acid, water, and resins are re moved from it. This not only prevents corrosion of metal pipes, but also reduces the consumption of wood for the manufacture of steel in Martin furnaces and increases their productive capacity.
AUSTRALIA
· Negotiations to arrange for an exchange of exports on a barter basis have been proceeding for some time between the Governments of Australia and the USSR. It is now proposed to exchange trial shipments of wheat, flour and other foodstuffs from Australia, for timber, paper and tinned fish from Russia. It is expected that these items, as well as wool, are most likely to provide a basis for future trade although other items would also be included in the trial shipments. The Australian Trade Commissioner in London has pointed out that Australian manufacturers are anxious to obtain additional supplies of softwoods and paper. Samples of Russian timber and paper have been received in Australia, but the quantities have not been large enough for manufacturers to test them thoroughly for suitability.
BRAZIL
· A study is being made of the possibilities of establishing a pulp and paper plant in Belem, Brazil. The Guama River, accessible from the plant, will provide transportation facilities for the pulpwood reported to be available from the timberlands in the area. If it is decided to complete the proposed project, it will be the first paper mill in the Amazon region.
BRITISH GUIANA
· Important proposals for the development of timber extraction and marketing appear in a report issued by the British Guiana and British Honduras Settlement Commission. The report states that an immediate start could be made with a large-scale forest project to extract 85,000 m³ (3,000,000 cu. ft.) of timber annually from the Bartica triangle and lower Essequibo in British Guiana, combined with a saw mill and veneer-peeling plant. It would employ about 1,000 workers in the jungle and probably 4,000 people in all.
BULGARIA
· Industrial production indices for the wood and paper industries are:
|
Wood |
Industry |
Paper |
Industry |
|
Year |
Index |
Year |
Index |
|
1939 |
100.0 |
1939 |
100.0 |
|
1940 |
115.2 |
1940 |
108.6 |
|
1941 |
86.8 |
1941 |
145.3 |
|
1942 |
122.8 |
1942 |
161.0 |
|
1943 |
113.8 |
1943 |
177.7 |
|
1944 |
93.8 |
1944 |
103.0 |
|
1945 |
203.1 |
1945 |
120.6 |
|
1946 |
304.8 |
1946 |
170.1 |
|
1947 |
431.4 |
1947 |
182.9 |
Exports and imports for the following five categories are:
|
Category |
Imports |
Exports |
||
|
1947 |
1946 |
1947 |
1946 |
|
|
Metric tons |
||||
|
Joinery and other uses |
1,306 |
292 |
|
|
|
Paper industry products |
20,159 |
36,924 |
|
|
|
Charcoal |
|
|
18,022 |
14,586 |
|
Veneer sheets |
|
|
273 |
63 |
|
Plywood sheets |
|
|
1,370 |
1,300 |
CANADA
· Gatineau, Quebec, is today becoming one of the greatest wood utilization centers of the world. It makes Novocell dissolving pulp and bleached pulp for bond and newsprint. Other enterprises in Gatineau are a big Masonite plant, a fiberboard plant, a plywood plant and soon to be operating what is said to be the biggest and most up-to-date sulphite effluent alcohol plant in the world.
· According to Foreign Trade, a Canadian government publication, present pulpwood production conditions throughout the Dominion are generally satisfactory. Production in the 1947-48 cutting season was the largest in history, amounting to 28.3 million m³ ® (11.1 million cords) in the area east of the Rocky Mountains. An increase of 19 percent over the 1946-47 season is attributed to more favorable weather conditions and adequate labor supply. The total production consisted of 19.6 million m³ ® (7.7 million cords) cut by companies on leased Crown lands and their own forest holdings, and 8.7 million m³ ® (3.4 million cords) purchased from independent pulpwood producers. As compared with the current seasonal output, the production in 1939-40 amounted to only 16.2 million m³ ® (6.35 million cords).
· Waste studies by the Forest Products Laboratories of Canada show that in manufacturing sawlogs into lumber, the following is the percentage breakdown:
|
|
(Douglas Fir) |
Spruce |
|
Green lumber |
72.7 |
49.0 |
|
Slabs, trim |
12.9 |
34.4 |
|
Sawdust |
14.4 |
16.6 |
The wide differences in the manufacturing procedure, in the size of the logs and in the size of the average mill between the Douglas fir region of western Canada and the spruce region of eastern Canada, preclude any direct comparison between the results of these waste studies.
CHILE
· Through its Corporacion de Fomento de la Produccion, the Chilean Government has recently applied for a loan from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development to aid in financing a proposed wood pulp mill. The mill is planned to be located at General Cruz, about 48 kilometers (30 miles) south of Chillan and is expected to be completed by 1952. The plant's production capacity is anticipated at 40,000 metric tons annually, of which 30,000 tons will be sulphate pulp.
CUBA
· A new rayon plant is soon to be completed by the Compania Rayonera Cubana S. A.; it is expected to employ 1,200 workers. Production for the first year is to reach 12,000 million pounds of staple fiber and rayon. Around 30 percent of this quantity will be absorbed by the home market; the balance will be exported.
FINLAND
· The small timber industries of Finland have created their own trade organization, the Co-operative Exporting Center for the Finnish Woodenware Industry. This organization consists of about 782 small and medium-sized factories. It deals both with the purchase of raw materials and the sale of products abroad and on the domestic market. Production includes finished and semifinished products. Furniture and wood used in the building industry are the most important. The latter include doors, window frames, flooring, and parquet boards.
· The trade agreement between Poland and Finland in March 1948 included, among other things, the delivery of 4, 000 prefabricated timber houses to Poland. The houses were shipped from Finnish ports to Gdynia; they were transported by rail to Upper Silesia, where most of them were erected. The building contractors were small firms, capable of erecting 50 to 100 houses in one contract operation. They could be classified into three groups-small private builders, co-operative building enterprises, and nationalized builders.
Within six months approximately 2,400 houses were put up. In 1947 the delivery of the houses lagged behind erection, because of shipping difficulties. In 1948, shipments proceeded according to schedule. Besides skilled labor, pupils of industrial trade schools also participated in the erection work. The simple construction methods used required less labor than for ordinary buildings.
· The agreement of 3 February 1947, regarding the use of former German assets taken over by the Soviet Union, provides for the establishment of a joint Finnish-Soviet rayon factory, to be called Viskoosa Oy. The chairman of the board of management will be appointed by the Soviet Union and the vice-chairman by Finland, while the executive director is appointed by Finland and his deputy by the Soviet Union. Every three years each of these officials will be appointed from the alternate country. It has been agreed that the Viskoosa factory will be erected in Oulu. Using sulphite cellulose as the principal raw material, it will produce artificial fibers and similar products. Production is planned at first to be about 1,400 or possibly 2,000 tons a year, eventually increasing to 4,000 to 6,000 tons. The labor force, chiefly women, will number some 1,400 to 1,500 at the beginning.
FRANCE
· A new plant for the production of fiberboard has been built by the Isorel Company. When this factory goes into operation at Casteljaloux, it will quadruple French production and be able to supply almost the total national requirement in the near future. Defibering of wood shavings is done mechanically under water vapor pressure by a Swedish process. Resins are mixed with the woodpulp. The factory is designed to produce 60 tons of fiberboard daily and to employ 150 workers. The plant will use sawmill waste from Les Landes pines as raw material.
GERMANY
· Official statistics for the wood industry in the British and American Zones are:
|
|
Number of plants |
Number of persons employed |
|
Sawmills |
8,066 |
74,950 |
|
Plywood factories |
58 |
6,153 |
|
Veneer factories |
39 |
1,557 |
|
Fiberboard factories |
4 |
751 |
|
Wood trading houses |
3,270 |
26,300 |
|
Total |
11,437 |
109,711 |
The sawmill industry is concentrated primarily in Bavaria, while the plywood and veneer factories are in Rhine provinces. Damage caused by the war appears to have been repaired and the industry has been restored to prewar capacity. However, raw materials (glue, in particular) and manpower are still in short supply.
GUATEMALA
· Hardwood exports are said to have been $757,573 in 1947, compared with $881,906 in 1946. By value, this was the country's fifth largest export item. The establishment of a plant for the production of high-quality hardwood plywood is reportedly under consideration.
INDIA
· A 12-year contract for a big prefabricated housing scheme, estimated to be worth $50,000,000, has been signed with a British firm by the Indian Government. It is estimated that about 10 million houses will be produced within the contract period.
· A newsprint and paper company in India is planning to build a newsprint mill at Chandni, between Khandwa and Burhanpur, in the Central Provinces. The Government of the Central Provinces and Berar has taken up shares having a face value of 1.5 million rupees (approximately $450,000), of which about one-third was made available to the Government in exchange for extensive concessions to the company and the use of certain facilities such as water, electricity, and transportation. Other advantages include a 40-year lease to the company for exploitation of 24,000 hectares of forest land containing suitable raw material for newsprint. A softwood broadleaved species which grows abundantly in the forest of Central India will be used. The Government also has guaranteed to furnish any part of the remaining capital not subscribed by the public within a specified period, in exchange for a share in the managing agents' commission. The factory is expected to go into production in the summer of 1949. Its initial output is to be about 100 tons daily, to be increased eventually to 400 tons daily.
· The Central Provinces and Berar Government also has subscribed 20 million rupees ($6,000,000) and 10 million rupees ($3,000,000) to another paper company, representing more than half of the issued capital. The firm will manufacture chemical and other wood pulp; writing, printing, and packing paper; and paperboard and strawboard. The plant will be located at Nagpur. The Government has agreed to lease to the Company 55,500 hectares of bamboo forests for exploitation. Machinery for the mill is to come from a Canadian firm which has contracted to participate in the capitalization of the company to the extent of I,650,000 rupees ($495,000).
KOREA
· The southern Korea paper industry carries on, but suffers severely from shortage of raw materials, electrical power, coal, etc. Paper production throughout southern Korea at the present time is of inferior quality and furnishes only about one-third of the normal requirements. Korea shares with China the distinction of producing some of the earliest papers known. Made by simple hand processes of selected native materials, these papers still find wide use in the building trades.
Ninety percent of the country's pulpmaking capacity is in the dense pine forests of northern Korea, while in southern Korea are the smaller nonintegrated paper mills dependent on the North for their raw materials. Not until the 1930's did Japan initiate on an expanding scale the manufacture of pulp or paper in northern Korea. Plants making mechanical sulphite and dissolving pulps were erected on the Manchurian border and on the east coast, as well as paper mills in various parts of the country. The yearly production in 1938 reached 38,000 tons of wood pulp and 8,300 tons of paper. The surplus of the pulp, together with the bulk of the paper production, was exported to Japan. Very little was contributed to the paper economy of south Korea, since statistics show that paper consumption in this region was less than one *pound per caput a year. In line with the wartime program of decentralization, the Japanese began in 1939 to move a number of mills to Korea. Certain of these mills were transferred to southern Korea. Production per mill varied from 70 to 80 tons per month. This migration of paper mills to Korea continued throughout the war and was not entirely completed at the time of liberation.
MEXICO
· A new kraft mill at Atenquique in the state of Jalisco, constructed in 1946, reached its production capacity of 120 tons of unbleached sulphate pulp daily in June 1947. Kraft paper is made from this pulp at the estimated rate of 18,000 tons annually.
A mill in Mexico, D. F., began operations in June 1947 for the production of paperboard and wrapping, bond, and mimeograph papers. Machinery from the company's old mill was used, and additional machinery and equipment was installed at the new mill.
The first mill in Mexico to manufacture facial tissue started operation late in December 1947. The mill also will manufacture toilet paper; production of all tissues will be approximately 1,200 tons annually.
A long-established mill in the Federal District was installing new machinery and equipment in June 1948. The additions included a modern 340 centimeter (134 inch) Fourdrinier paper machine for lightweight papers, a mechanical pulp mill, a steam power plant, and accessory equipment. Another mill in the Federal District began to operate one of its two machines early, in 1948, and the second was in the process of installation in June 1948. The mill will produce coarse wrapping paper and paperboard from waste paper; imported pulp will not be required. A second paperboard plant, which will use imported pulp, is located at Tlalnepantla and is expected to begin operations by the end of 1948. A plant for the production of cigarette paper and various types of tissues, also located at Tlalnepantla, was expected to start production sometime in 1948.
Plans have been made to build a kraft paper mill near Monterrey, according to a report of several months ago. Pulp for the paper would be purchased from the United States or Canada. Although the plant is to have only kraft paper-making equipment at the start, equipment for grinding pulpwood into pulp may be installed later. In April 1948, a project was being studied by the Union de Madereros (lumbermen's union) de Chihuahua for the construction of a wood pulp mill and a paper manufacturing plant in the state of Chihuahua.
NETHERLANDS
· The Dutch government has contracted for the delivery from Finland of 100 wooden schools to be delivered in readymade elements. Fifty schools were to be delivered before the end of 1948, the remaining 50 at the beginning of 1949. The foundations were prepared before the schools arrived in Holland, and a school with six classrooms was to be completed within 80 days. The schools are delivered with five, six, seven, or eight rooms, completely arranged with central gas-heating, accommodations for the head teacher, washrooms, etc. They are not intended as provisional accommodations but as permanent buildings.
NEWFOUNDLAND
· The largest newsprint machine in the world has gone into operation at Corner-brook Mill, making this the largest integrated pulp and paper mill in existence. Newsprint 676 centimeters (266 inches) wide will roll from the new machine at a maximum rate of 610 meters (2,000 ft.) per minute, giving the unit a capacity of 100,000 tons per year and making the annual capacity of the mill about 300,000 tons of newsprint and 55,000 tons of exportable sulphite pulp. The machine, which took two years to build, was 60 percent Canadian made, 30 percent British, and 10 percent U. S.
SCANDINAVIA
· A general analysis of the history of the wood industry in Norway, Sweden, and Finland shows a continuous progress from west to east and the influence of domestic and foreign factors. It might be said that Norway, with comparatively restricted forest resources, has already passed the lumber production stage and is now concentrating on finished products, while Finland is still at the first stage, since lumber and other semi-finished products still constitute the major part of its production. Sweden is in a position halfway between these two.
At the beginning of the seventeenth century, Sweden and Finland together exported an annual total of 1,500 standards only, whereas Norwegian exports amounted to 50,000 standards. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Norwegian exports totaled 250,000 standards, while the combined quantities exported from the two other Scandinavian countries amounted to 30,000 standards.
Toward the end of the last century, the introduction of mechanical and chemical wood pulp as a raw material for the manufacture of paper brought about a radical change in the wood industry of these three countries. The proportion of wood pulp and its by-products in regard to the total production is increasing continuously at the expense of sawn timber. It is probable that, in the course of the next two decades, the proportion of sawn timber in relation to the total production of the wood industry will vary between 10 percent and 20 percent in all three Scandinavian countries.
RUMANIA
· Rumanian statistics credit the country, within its present boundaries, with 6.0 million hectares of forest, which is about 25 percent of the total area. Of this, about 500,000 hectares are in mountainous territory and are inaccessible for exploitation. Transylvania, with nearly 2.8 million hectares, contains 45 percent of the total forest area. Next in order come Moldavia, Muntenia (Greater Walachia), Banat, and Oltenia (Little Walachia). Rumania is predominantly a country of broadleaved forests, which represent 75 percent of the total. By species, the forests are said to be distributed as follows:
|
Species |
1,000 hectares |
Percent |
|
Conifers |
1,541 |
26 |
|
Beech |
2,364 |
40 |
|
Oak |
1,182 |
20 |
|
Other broadleaf |
677 |
11 |
|
Soft broadleaf |
192 |
3 |
|
Total |
5,956 |
100 |
By ownership, the forests are divided into: State, 24.8 percent; co-operative and other public organizations, 43.2 percent; and private and local, 32 percent. As a result of the agrarian reform of 1945, the area of state and other public forests has increased at the expense of the large private forest estates.
The theoretical annual growth ranges between 1.8 to 2.5 m³ ® per hectare. The total growth for the entire forest area cannot amount, therefore, to more than 15 million m³ ®. The annual cut before the war exceeded the growth. In 1939, 17.5 million m³ ® were cut. Firewood accounted for not less than 50 percent of the total volume cut. As a result of war devastation, many sawmills went out of operation and the annual production of timber dropped considerably. During 1945-46 (from September to September), the cut amounted to only 9.7 million m³ ®, of which only 3.7 million m³ ® were sawtimber. The lumber industry showed, however, a marked revival in 1946-47, and the total was estimated to be 13.5 million m³ ®; i.e., an increase of 40 percent in one year. A further increase is expected in 1947 and 1948.
There are in Rumania today some 730 sawmills with 1,280 saw units. Most of them are old and poorly equipped. In the villages there are also some 1,42.5 small water-operated sawmills. In addition, there are some 200 other wood-using enterprises of which 11 are veneer factories with a yearly output of 14,000 tons. The paper and cellulose industry is centered in 18 plants, of which only seven are of any considerable size. The total prewar annual production of cellulose and paper was 59,000 tons (1938).
Production in 1946-47 was 42,000 tons of paper and 10,000 tons of cardboard (paperboard), or nearly at the prewar level.
The export trade before the war consisted largely of unprocessed or semiprocessed wood products, such as logs, box shooks, railroad ties, mining timber, balances, cordwood, etc. The total export in volume amounted in 1937 to about 2 million m³ and in 1938 close to 1.75 million m³.
SWEDEN
· A contract for the delivery of Swedish prefabricated timber houses to the Argentine Government was signed recently, after negotiations which began at the end of 1947. The delivery, comprising between 600 and 700 houses, will be completed during the summer of 1949 according to reports from the Swedish manufacturers. The houses, of three types, will be used by engineers and workmen at the large electrification projects now under way in Argentina.
· The results of an approximate survey of the Swedish consumption of fiberboards are reported as follows.
|
Year |
M2 per caput |
|
1938 |
2.6 |
|
1939 |
3.5 |
|
1940 |
2.4 |
|
1941 |
3.3 |
|
1942 |
4.2 |
|
1943 |
3.6 |
|
1944 |
5.0 |
TURKEY
· Total production of wood pulp in Turkey in 1947 was 13,500 metric tons, made up of 7,500 tons of sulphite pulp and 6,000 tons of groundwood pulp. In 1948 production was 6,700 tons of sulphite pulp and 5,600 tons of groundwood - a total of 12,300 tons. Imports of wood pulp totaled 3,860 tons in 1947, of which 2,640 tons were sulphite pulp and 1,220 tons sulphate. In 1948 the total was 6,000 tons, of which 5,025 tons were sulphite pulp and 975 tons sulphate.
UNITED KINGDOM
· From December 1945 to June 1948 approximately 280,000 houses were built or repaired in England, 250,000 of which were new and 30,000 repaired. The following figures indicate the number of permanent dwellings under construction: June 1946, 100,000 houses; June 1947, 200,000 houses; and June 1948, 170,000 houses. The highest number, approximately 220,000 houses under construction, was reached in September and October 1947. There has been a perceptible drop since that time.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
· The International Paper Company has announced that it will build a new pulp mill for the production of dissolving wood pulp used in the manufacture of rayon, cellophane, plastics, and other products. This plant will be built at Natchez, Mississippi, on a 400 hectare (1000 acre) site and construction is scheduled for completion in early 1950. The new plant will have a yearly capacity of about 100,000 tons of dissolving pulp.
The significance of this development lies in the fact that, for the first time in the history of the manufacture of dissolving pulps, hardwoods instead of softwoods can be used, and the process is based on the sulphate instead of the sulphite process traditionally used for making such pulps. It is claimed that the new project involves radical changes in the sulphate process and entirely novel methods of purification and bleaching. A dissolving pulp is obtained which not only produces yarns and other end-products of superior strength, but which can be processed more rapidly by converting industries at lower operating costs and at a considerable saving in capital investment.
Two other American rayon producers have also embarked on dissolving wood pulp projects. The Celanese Corporation of America is constructing a dissolving wood pulp plant near Point Edward, British Columbia, with an initial annual capacity of about 75,000 tons. This plant is expected to be completed within the next two years. The Ketchikan Pulp and Paper Company, of which the American Viscose Corporation is a principal stockholder, plans to build a dissolving pulp mill at Ketchikan, Alaska, with an annual capacity of 100,000 tons, construction to begin in mid-1949.
By these three projects alone, North America's dissolving wood pulp capacity over the next several years would potentially be increased by about 275,000 tons. It is estimated that the combined dissolving and chemical grade wood pulp output of the United States and Canada in 1948 will approximate 750,000 short tons.
UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
· At the margin of the Karelian woods, near Petrozawodsk, a large factory has been built for the manufacture of prefabricated houses. This is one of 18 factories to be established in various parts of the country near forest areas, to provide housing for industrial workers. The equipment of the factory will allow an annual production of 4 million two and three-room units, with a total room surface of 200,000 m². The first delivery is destined for the workers at Azovstal, a large steel factory on Lake Azov. Another factory for the production of prefab houses, with a similar capacity, is being completed on the Kama River, near Molotov in the Ural district.
· Southern (formerly Japanese) Sakhalin, with an area of 36,000 km², has 28,000 km² or 77 percent under forest. According to statistics for 1940, there were 235 million m³ ® of standing timber: spruce and fir, 182 million; larch, 15 million; and hardwoods, 38 million m³ ®. The spruce and fir stands are of poor quality, having a growing stock of from 200 to 250 m³ ® per hectare. Some 750 kilometers of railway have been built. Nine pulp mills were erected. In 1946 the consumption of wood by pulp mills, coal mining, and fisheries amounted to 5 Million m³ ®. Most of the logging was done by the Paper Mills Trust, which controlled all mills. The exploitation is entirely for coniferous pulpwood and is said to be very wasteful. It is practically clear cutting of all trees down to 15 centimeters in diameter breast high. Wood down to 8 centimeters in top diameter was utilized. No trees are cut into saw timber or firewood, and the hardwoods are left standing. For every 4.5 million m³ ® of pulpwood, it is estimated that 7 to 8 Million m³ ® of standing timber are actually felled. One factory had to close down in 1944 because of the exhaustion of the pulpwood supply within economic range. Five more mills may run out of supplies in another 4 to 8 years; the remaining three have supplies to last them for 14 to 20 years.
Fire control is very strict; the fires are largely confined to the cut-over areas. Because of accumulated slash and subsequent fires, because of grass, natural regeneration is made difficult. The Pulp and Paper Trust maintains about 100 nurseries and planted, with spruce and fir, more than 20,000 hectares of cutover land that failed to regenerate naturally. Planting of poplar species from Canada for some reason proved unsuccessful.
· The depletion of aspen stands available to the match industry is a serious problem. The need of finding substitutes to replace aspen as the principal raw material has been felt for the last 15 years. Onesixth of all the aspen wood received by the match industry in 1947 had to be entirely discarded as fit only for firewood. The most suitable available substitute is the wood of conifers: pine, spruce, and fir. Studies of the mechanical and physical properties of the wood of these species are under way with the indication that pine comes nearest to meeting the requirements.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA
· In July 1948, a new law on afforestation, protective forest belts, and construction of new ponds was enacted. All owners of forests under this law are made responsible for proper care and management of the existing forests and for planting new forest or protective forest belts on land not suitable for other agricultural purposes. The law further stipulates that private land may be confiscated for this purpose if such measures are necessary for improving local climatic conditions.
ITALY
· A draft law to combat unemployment has been prepared by the Italian Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare. It provides for the establishment of forest camps in regions where unemployment is widespread, for the purpose of reforestation, improvement, or management of mountain forests. These camps will be organized at the request of interested private owners or upon the initiative of the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare on land within the perimeter of the area to be reforested or to be included in a scheme of forest management by the Forest Service, which will be responsible for the technical direction of the operations and will retain ultimate control over the Work done.
Each camp will have at its head a manager, who will be responsible both to the Ministry and to the landowner for its functioning and who will be authorized to employ a certain number of instructors and assistant instructors in proportion to the size of the camp.
NIGERIA
· The country's main forest-policy objective is the production of the maximum benefit to the greatest number from the minimum amount of forest which is essential for the general well-being of the country. To achieve this object, two basic principles are to be observed: (a) the climatic and physical condition of the country must be preserved by the control, maintenance, or rehabilitation of vegetation, of the rainwater run-off in those are-as where lack of control would cause damage to other lands or waterways and endanger water supplies and soil fertility; (b) the supply in perpetuity of all forms of forest produce to satisfy the wants of the people must be assured by the acquisition and preservation of an adequate forest estate. The development of Nigeria makes it imperative that the area of land required for the growth of forest produce be reduced to the absolute minimum. Unassisted natural forest must, therefore, be developed under controlled and planned management. Since planned management is impossible without security of tenure, first attention must therefore be given to the secure establishment of the forest estate, with a balanced distribution throughout Nigeria as far as natural and other circumstances permit.
· As a result of a recent decree which elevated the Forestry Division in the Ministry of Agriculture of the Argentine Republic to the stature of a Department of Forests, its Director, Lucas A. Tortorelli, has become its Director-General. Jorge N. F. Carmelich has received the title of Inspector-General.
· Pierre Terver, who has been with the Forest Products Branch of FAO's Division of Forestry and Forest Products in Washington for the past year, has been appointed Chief of the Division's Latin-American Working Group. This Group will have offices in Rio de Janeiro. Mr. Terver is at present touring countries of Central and South America, making arrangements for a first meeting of the Latin-American Commission on Forestry and Forest Products, the establishment of which was recommended by the Teresopolis Conference in 1948.
· Herman Haupt Chapman of New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A., professor emeritus of forest management at Yale University and past president of the Society of American Foresters, was awarded the Sir William Schlich memorial medal on December 17 at the annual meeting of the Society held in Boston, Massachusetts.
In honor of Sir William Schlich, an eminent international leader in forestry, a fund was established fifteen years ago by foresters of English-speaking nations in recognition of Sir William's great services to forestry in India, England, and throughout the world. The Society of American Foresters is custodian of the periodic grants made to the United States by the Schlich Memorial Foundation, and from time to time awards the Schlich memorial medal for noteworthy achievement in the advancement of forestry.
It has been previously presented to, only four other persons: Franklin D. Roosevelt, Gifford Pinchot, Henry S. Graves, and William B. Greeley. Presentation of the medal to Dr. Chapman was made by Clyde S. Martin, president of the Society of American Foresters.
· The FAO staff in the Geneva Forestry Office was increased last November by the appointment of a new Technical Officer, Mr. Eero Kalkkinen. Mr. Kalkkinen studied in the University of Helsinki and specialized in the fields of Economics and Business Administration. Before joining FAO, he worked with commercial firma both in Belgium and in the United Kingdom. Mr. Kalkkineu is attached to the Forest Products Branch.
· Tuttu Tarkiainen has recently joined the Forest Products Branch of the Division of Forestry and Forest Products. Dr. Tarkiainen, after attending the Geneva School of International Studies, served in the diplomatic service of Finland from 1934 to 1944, being Attaché of the legation in Moscow for two years and afterwards First Secretary and Chargé d'Affaires a.i. in Rome. From August 1944 to November 1945, he was Chief of the Commercial Division and auxiliary Director of the Central Association of Finnish Woodworking Industries, and then for three years Commercial Advisor at the head office of the Enso-Gutzeit Osakeyhtio Concern at Helsinki. Amongst other positions which he has filled, Dr. Tarkiainen was secretary of the Finnish Group of the Interparliamentary Union, 1938-1939, secretary of the Finnish Delegation during commercial negotiations with Sweden, 1941-1943, and member of the Finnish delegation during commercial negotiations with France in 1942 and with Denmark in 1947. Before joining FAO, he served also as secretary-general of the National FAO Committee of Finland.
In view of the interest that the book must present to foresters and to students of that long-range trend, that is bringing all natural renewable resources under control, and in view of the fact that Zon was both an old friend of Gifford Pinchot and very much bound up with all the struggles and controversies described, UNASYLVA has departed front its usual custom by presenting a signed review.
Breaking New Ground. By Gifford Pinchot. 550 pp. Harcourt, Brace and Company, New York. $5.
Reviewed by RAPHAEL ZON
This is the story of a very exciting and epic period in the struggle for the development of a National Forest Policy in the United States. Although played out on the American scene against the background of American economic and political conditions, this struggle has worldwide implications. It is a pattern which many countries, rich in natural resources, invariably do go through at an earlier or later stage in their development, with different political and economic modifications, of course, peculiar to them, in evolving a rational policy in the handling of their forests and other natural resources. This struggle may differ, therefore, in intensity and form in different parts of the world, but the essence of the pattern remains very much the same. Since there are still many countries which are just now going through the process and still others which are just awakening to the need of a practical conservation program, the U. S. experience as depicted in Breaking New Ground should prove of absorbing interest and benefit.
The international sweep and significance of the book is heightened in particular by the fact that it is not only the story of how practical forestry came to America but also of how the fight for forestry gave birth to a world movement for conservation of all natural resources - a program that has now become in a large measure the creed and goal of some 58 nations which voluntarily banded together into what is known as the Food and Agriculture Organization to make this program a reality.
As early as 1909 Pinchot already envisaged the need for some international organization like FAO. This is clear from the Aide-Memoire prepared by him and sent to the principal governments to sound them out informally whether they would look with favor on sending delegates to a world conference on conservation. The points which lie emphasized in that Aide-Memoire were that the people of the whole world are interested in the natural resources of the whole world; that they are benefited by the conservation of these resources and injured by their destruction; and that the people of every country are interested in the supply of food and of material for manufacture in every other country. This is not only because these are interchangeable in trade, but because a knowledge of the total supply is necessary to the intelligent treatment of each nation's share of the supply. The Aide-Memoire significantly concludes with the statement that reading the lessons of the past aright, it would be for such a conference to look beyond the present to the future. Pinchot always looked upon an international conference on conservation merely is a precursor, as a first step toward a permanent international organization. Since the responses to this Aide-Memoire were favorable, invitations were sent to 48 nations to meet at the Peace Palace at the Hague in September 1909. Thirty of the nations, including Great Britain, France, Germany, and Canada, had already accepted when a change of the administration in March. 1909 indefinitely delayed the plan. Pinchot later made two attempts to revive it, but without success. However, lie did not stop agitating for it. In a talk before the Eighth American Scientific Congress in May 1940 in Washington, he contended that international cooperation to survey, conserve, and wisely utilize natural resources to the mutual advantage of all nations might well remove one of the most dangerous obstacles to a just and permanent world peace. In 1944 he laid the plan before President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who grasped the full implications of the idea and expressed the desire for rapid action. His untimely death left it to President Truman to carry out the plan. A few days before Pinchot's death, President Truman sent to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations the plan embodying the idea of a World Conservation Conference. In March 1947 the United Nations approved the plan, and a United Nations Scientific Conference on Conservation and Utilization of Resources was authorized to be held in June 1949. While efforts were made to call a World Conference on Natural Resources, the FAO came into being (in October 1945). Its creation was an answer to Pinchot's prayer, a fulfilment of his hopes, even before the World Conference on Resources, upon which lie counted merely as a stepping stone for a permanent organization, had actually taken place. Part Ten of the book entitled "A World Movement is Born" should carry, therefore, a particularly strong and intimate appeal to all member nations of the FAO.
But to come back to the main story itself. It begins in 1889 when Gifford Pinchot, just out of Yale, decided to make forestry his profession and set off to Europe to get the scientific training that could not be obtained then in the United States. His choice fell on the French Ecole Nationale Forestière probably because his grandfather was French, a soldier of Napoleon.
When Pinchot returned at the end of 1890 to the United States, lie found the country obsessed by a fury of agricultural and industrial expansion. New railroads were opening new territory; settlers were pushing farther and farther into the wilderness. Wood-and plenty of it - was needed; without it the United States could never have reached the high degree of comfort, progress, and power it now enjoys. But hand-in-hand with this expansion there was also going on the most rapid and most wasteful forest destruction ever known. The Federal Government was disposing the public land as fast as it could to states and railroads in the form of grants. The Northern Pacific Railroad, for example, received almost 40 million acres; the States in turn passed on their timberlands into private ownership. North Carolina, for instance, has disposed some of its finest hardwood forests for 10 cents an acre. The richest government timberlands could be legitimately bought for $2.50 an acre. Mining companies helped themselves each year to many millions of feet of government timber, for which they paid nothing. Stealing government timber was almost a common and normal occupation. Forest tires raged unchecked. They were regarded as acts of God, beyond human control. Twelve million acres of timber burning up annually did not shock the public conscience. Forest devastation was regarded as normal, and forest regeneration as a delusion of fools. Sustained yield was in unknown concept. There were no forest schools, no trained foresters, and not a single acre of government, state, or private timberland was under systematic forest management. Such was the situation in the United States at the end of the last century.
In July 1898, Pinchot became the first Federal Forester. His offices consisted of two small rooms on a top floor of an old building, long since torn down. His entire staff, including himself, was made up of eleven people. Of these, only two had some forest training abroad. The annual appropriation was $28,500, and the entire equipment consisted of one tape measure, one pair of calipers, and one increment borer. In the course of one decade, there occurred an almost revolutionary change in the government land policy and in the public attitude toward the forest and the rest of the natural resources - water, soil, grazing, water power development, reclamation of a rid lands, flood controls, and inland waterways. For ten years it was a strenuous fight against the greed of private interests, bureaucratic corruption, and public indifference to show that sound forestry can produce lumber without destroying the forest. The movement became a veritable crusade; hard battles were raging in the halls of Congress; conservation became a political issue in a Presidential campaign; the issues were carried to the highest courts of the land; and public opinion was greatly aroused. The old order was dying hard. The conservationists, thanks to the enthusiastic support of the then President Theodore Roosevelt, finally won a large measure of the needed reform, and Pinchot at the end of his life could look with proper pride on the structure for which he laid the solid foundations: some 179 million acres of National Forests under management by some 2,600 professional foresters; 12 million acres of state forests also under management by trained foresters; 9 Regional Forest Experiment Stations and a unique institution - The Forest Products Laboratory - devoted to the study of wood in all its aspects; and 29 forest schools of college grade, with a total enrollment of about 7,900 students and an annual graduating class of some 1,500 young foresters. Controlled grazing on public land and fire danger to the forest were reduced to an insurable risk. The task, however, still remains unfinished, because a vast area of privately owned forests is still largely lacking systematic forest management. This is a battle that is still to be won.
Since the story is told by a man who was one of the main actors in the entire struggle, the book takes the form of an autobiography. You can sense throughout the entire book the vigor and strenuousness of the life the author lived. Accounts of political battles in Washington alternate with stories of adventure in the wilderness of a vast unexplored land. Such is the story of a great popular movement and its great leader, whose guiding principle in life was, "The public good comes first."
ECE/FAO Quarterly Bulletin - Timber Statistics, Vol. I, No. 3.
Latest figures on timber production, stocks, exports and imports of most of the countries of Europe with the U.S.A. and Canada, are reported in the third Quarterly Bulletin of Timber Statistics published jointly by FAO and ECE at Geneva. The information covers data for nine months of 1948, compared with data for the same period of 1947. The Bulletin is issued in a bilingual English/French edition, and is on sale by FAO and sales agents for United Nations publications.
Journal of Range Management. Vol. 1, No. 1, 1948. Baltimore, Md., U. S. A. Published Quarterly by the American Society of Range Management. Subscription $3.00, single copies $1.00.
In 1947 the American Society of Range Management was organized. It has set as its objectives "To foster advancement in the science and art of grazing land management, to promote progress in the conservation and greatest sustained use of forage and soil resources, to stimulate discussion and understanding of scientific and practical range and pasture problems, to provide a medium for the exchange of ideas and facts among society members and with allied technologists, and to encourage professional improvement of its members." Although range management has since the early years of the century been a major part of forest and wildland management, this is the first professional society available to range management researchers, teachers and managers. Volume 1, number 1, of the Journal contains articles describing the Society and the Journal, and giving the Constitution and By-Laws, as well as the officers, council, committees and members, the latter now numbering over 650. There are four technical articles on "Milestones in Range Management," "Getting New Range Plants into Practice," "Succession in Sagebrush," and "The Mulch Layer of California Annual Ranges." News and notes, book reviews and a bibliography of current range literature are other departments. Reports on significant research and experience, as they appear from time to time, may well prove of value in other countries as well as the U. S. A.
The Nations accepting this Constitution, being determined to promote the common welfare by furthering separate and collective action on their part for the purposes of raising levels of nutrition and standards of living of the peoples under their respective jurisdictions, securing improvements in the efficiency of the production and distribution of all food and agricultural products, in bettering the condition of rural populations, and thus contributing toward an expanding world economy, hereby establish the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations... through which the Members will report to one another on the measures taken and the progress achieved in the fields of action set forth above.
Preamble to the Constitution of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
FAO Member Nations
AUSTRALIA
AUSTRIA
BELGIUM
BOLIVIA
BRAZIL
BURMA
CANADA
CEYLON
CHILE
CHINA
COLOMBIA
COSTA RICA
CUBA
CZECHOSLOVAKIA
DENMARK
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
ECUADOR
EGYPT
ETHIOPIA
EL SALVADOR
FINLAND
FRANCE
GREECE
GUATEMALA
HAITI
HONDURAS
HUNGARY
ICELAND
INDIA
IRAQ
IRELAND
ITALY
LEBANON
LIBERIA
LUXEMBOURG
MEXICO
NETHERLANDS
NEW ZEALAND
NICARAGUA
NORWAY
PAKISTAN
PANAMA
PARAGUAY
PERU
PHILIPPINE REPUBLIC
POLAND
PORTUGAL
SAUDI ARABIA
SIAM
SWITZERLAND
SYRIA
TURKEY
UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA
UNITED KINGDOM
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
URUGUAY
VENEZUELA
YUGOSLAVIA
