Industrial forestry is relatively new in the United States. The profession has grown, particularly since 1930, much as American citizens have grown in their awareness of the practical significance of forestry, of the forester's relationship to national economics and social welfare, of profit and loss in the forest enterprise, of the change that came about when forest industries, which once had asked only how much timber stood on an acre, began to ask how much and in how long a time timber would grow on an acre.

A forester, who earlier had been able to make little contribution to an operation that was concerned almost wholly with the harvest, became essential to an operation that was concerned with husbanding what it had and with growing more for future harvests.

Then professional foresters began to enter industry. By 1930, nearly 400 of them were regularly employed in industry. By 1940, there were 1,000. In 1949, the number of professional foresters in private employ is estimated at more than 2,500. Public employment still absorbs the majority of college-trained men of the woods, but today the most rapidly expanding field of employment is in industry.

This greater awareness of woodland management, from seedling to harvest, was given further impetus by the Copeland Report in 1933, and also by the inclusion of forestry provisions in the National Recovery Administration codes established under the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933. Both coincided roughly with wider recognition by forest industries, which planned to stay in business, that forest acres must be kept productive and that conscious effort and investment must be made for that purpose.

The recommendations of the Copeland Report met with a mixed reception, but the report did focus attention on the opportunities and responsibilities of private ownership with respect to forest lands. Under NRA in 1934, forest industries were the first to adopt a conservation code, with provisions tending toward forest practices that would assure continuous and adequate timber crops. The committees and activities of that comprehensive program did not end with NRA in 1935. The thinking then engendered continued to influence later action, and, in many instances, machinery then set up by industries continued to operate in other forms.

A DISTINCTION is to be drawn between an industrial forestry association and the other organizations concerned with forests. In such a broad and diverse field as the forests of America, it is not surprising that the latter organizations are many and various. In general, their concern with forestry is based on broad considerations of national welfare. Some restrict their activities to individual States or regions. Others have specific objectives, in which forests play a part, such as conservation of wildlife and recreational facilities. For their membership, they look to public-spirited citizens in general. Although many of them are substantially supported by forest industries, they are not industrial forestry groups as such.

INDUSTRIAL GROUPS, in their forestry activities, are concerned chiefly with the business of growing, protecting, and harvesting trees. Their support comes from those who use wood as their raw material. With other types of associations interested in forests, the industrial group looks to permanently productive forests as its objective, but, in addition, it must consider costs and techniques. Although not all the forest industries are represented now by such groups, the major companies and possibly major production are so represented.

The typical pattern of such industrial activities can be found in trade associations.

First, such activities took the form of consulting services for association members, many of whom believed they could not afford their own forestry departments. But this activity broadened. It was obvious, for example, that forest industries could not depend exclusively upon their own lands for future supply, because collectively they own not more than 18 percent of the commercial tree-producing lands of the country. It became apparent, too, that a public unaware of tree growing as a form of agriculture could be a serious obstacle to forest management on vast areas. So, in many instances, the forestry activities of industrial groups expanded to reach other types of woodland owners and to enlist the understanding cooperation of the public.

This broadening view has given rise to two young but thriving movements in American forestry. One is the Keep America Green program. The other is the American Tree Farms system. Neither is exclusively an industrial activity now, but each had industrial origin and support. Each, in its field, is contributing to better forest protection and management, upon which so many agencies, public and private, are at work. Both function locally, but both have spread across the Nation.

Keep America Green is popular education in forest-fire prevention. Twenty-four States had organized their own Keep Green programs by the beginning of 1949, directed in most instances by State Keep Green committees, in which industry and other interests are represented.

The Tree Farm program is a means of encouraging better forest practices by woodland owners, large and small, and a method of informing the public of the practical purposes and importance of forestry. At the beginning of 1949, the Tree Farm movement was active in 23 States. Its certified tree farms totaled nearly 17 million acres. Although this acreage is not great in relation to the 344,973,000 acres of privately owned forest lands, tree-farm certifications have shown an average increase of 2 million acres a year in the first 7 years of the program. Through publicity and example, the movement helps interpret the nature of our forests to many Americans.

FOREST-FIRE ASSOCIATIONS of the West were among the early organized industrial activities relating to forests. The paramount task of controlling forest fires was assumed by such private groups, sometimes in advance of public action. Often a regional group of timberland owners would pool their holdings, meeting costs by a charge per acre. Following disastrous fires, such as the Yacolt burn in 1902, private protection agencies were formed in Washington, Oregon, California, and Idaho between 1905 and 1912.

The principle thus established of each timber owner paying the cost of protecting his own property—in a cooperative arrangement with neighboring owners—set an important precedent. The principle was incorporated into several State compulsory patrol laws. The associations were instrumental in developing Western State fire codes; they stressed practical problems first, such as adequate equipment in the field, closed burning seasons, compulsory slash disposal, and shut-downs during bad fire weather. They created a consciousness of the necessity for joint action in combating a common enemy. Such experience contributed much to the molding of the Clarke-McNary Law of 1924, which expressed the Federal policy of cooperation with States and private owners in forest protection.

THE WESTERN FORESTRY AND CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION, organized in 1909, became a sort of "grand lodge" of both private and public protection agencies in the West. It is probably senior today in the industrial forestry field. The genius of its manager, Edward T. Allen, gave western forestry far-reaching national, as well as local, leadership:

Its activities illustrate the changing emphasis resulting from changing conditions. Originally, it was to be a clearing house to promote cooperation in all private, Federal, State, and provincial forestry activities—chiefly fire—in Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Montana, California and British Columbia. In its early days it concentrated largely on forest fires, and exchanged information on fire-control problems, reports, and statistics. It sponsored and promoted State forest codes. It won quick recognition for effective work.

In the years since, the association has undertaken various educational tasks. It published a textbook on western forestry; made basic studies in forest taxation, which led to later improvements in land taxes; investigated timber insurance problems; studied pine blister rust; and provided professional foresters to help western companies get better forest production.

Today its emphasis is on education in forestry, improvement of management practices on small holdings, and other silvicultural activities that tend toward a sustained-yield program for its area. It serves as a coordinating force among private, State, Federal, and provincial agencies. Its annual meetings have become notable in its region as forums on forest subjects.

THE NATIONAL LUMBER MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION established a permanent forestry committee pursuant to a resolution adopted on April 20, 1920. The resolution recognized that "both national and industrial welfare demand early development of an American forest policy which shall substitute for indifference or accident an intelligent, practical, equitable, and concerted program for the perpetuation of forest supplies."

The association is a federation of regional lumber associations and represents these associations in broad national policy and action. The work of its forestry committee and conservation department has been largely informational, statistical, and legislative. The association has usually employed one or more foresters to assist in these activities.

In the field of practicing forestry, the organized efforts of the lumber industry have been concentrated in the regional groups. In the field of general education along forestry lines, the national association has given support to the American Forest Products Industries.

THE SOUTHERN PINE ASSOCIATION created its conservation department in 1934, but its interest in forestry goes back many years before that. In 1916, it was instrumental in calling the first Southern Forestry Conference, one of whose objectives was to initiate and support State legislation to promote forestry in the South. Five Southern States had forestry departments then; the conference and subsequent activities played a part in creating such departments in all Southern States.

The organization of Southern Pine's conservation department in 1934 was further recognition of the fact that the permanent existence of the lumber industry in the Southern States depended on the continuous production of timber crops on privately owned woodlands. The conservation department has represented the southern pine lumber industry, in 12 States, in efforts to develop adequate control of forest fires, adopt sound cutting practices and equitable taxation of forest lands, strengthen State forestry organizations, and develop legislation relating to forests.

The conservation committee consists of members from each of the southern pine-producing States. Its activities are directed by a technical forester and an assistant forester.

An outstanding phase of the committee's work is the Tree Farm system in the South, in cooperation with State organizations. This program resulted in the certification, by October 1948, of 1,202 tree farms, with 9,866,938 acres, in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Tennessee, and Virginia.

In general, Southern Pine Association, through its conservation department, advises members on individual forestry problems; conducts timber-production meetings, which show practical applications of harvesting and logging methods; helps to establish demonstrations of cutting practices; provides an information service on national and State activities and legislation affecting forest lands; and engages in general education on forestry, including a statistical service.

THE WEST COAST LUMBERMEN'S ASSOCIATION, which represents leading producers of Douglas-fir lumber, also started a conservation department in 1934 to formulate and administer forest-practice rules for the region under the National Industrial Recovery Act. The Pacific Northwest Loggers' Association joined this activity, and a joint committee on conservation was set up, with representatives of both associations, the State foresters of Washington and Oregon, the Federal foresters of the region, and leaders of the two private forest-fire associations.

Although NIRA came to an end in 1935, the joint committee on forest conservation has continued to function without interruption. It has employed up to five professional foresters. The services of its staff have been made available both to members and others.

The committee has sponsored the Tree Farm program in the Douglas-fir region since 1941. By October 1948, more than 2,744,155 acres of private lands had been certified as tree farms. Periodic inspections of the areas are made to check forestry performance.

At the same time, and partly to implement the Tree Farm program, the staff developed a cooperative industrial nursery at Nisqually, Wash., which supplies members with seedlings at cost. Thus, for the first time, a major source of planting stock became available to forest industries in the area, since public nurseries were restricted by law to use their seedlings for planting on public or farmer-owned lands. By the end of 1947, the nursery had shipped more than 17 million seedlings; orders for delivery in 1948 totaled 6 million. At an average rate of 500 seedlings to the acre, nonrestocked lands replanted by the end of 1948 totaled more than 45,000 acres.

The staff performs other services, many advisory, such as: Cooperation with State forestry departments regarding fire prevention, slash disposal, fire-weather shut-downs, and similar protection activities; assistance to private operators regarding the cutting problems, restocking, partial cuttings, thinnings, and other silvicultural measures; and advice on reforestation, taxation, and public timber sales.

The committee serves also as a liaison body between private and public agencies on matters of forest policy and practice.

THE WESTERN PINE ASSOCIATION serves lumber manufacturers in an area roughly equal to 35 percent of continental United States. Its members manufacture about 80 percent of the lumber made in the area, chiefly from the ponderosa, Idaho white, and sugar pines. It was organized under its present name in 1931, although predecessor organizations date from 1906.

The association has been instrumental in drawing up and adopting forest-practice rules to be followed by the industry. The rules have been revised from time to time and, in 1945, were published as handbooks for each State in the region.

By that and other means, the association has encouraged the practical application of principles of conservation and sustained production of forest crops. Today's forestry staff of four members is double that of 10 years ago, and expenditures in forestry activities have tripled. Its committee on conservation formulates forestry policies.

Under this program, the association reports substantial progress in the adoption of company programs working toward sustained yield. In 1937, 18 companies, with a production of 763,631,000 board feet a year, had adopted measures leading to that goal. Since then, 59 companies, with a yearly production of nearly 2 billion board feet, have started working toward continuous forest production. The western pine industry employs 90-some foresters.

Encouragement is given such activities by the Tree Farm program, which the association has sponsored in its region since 1942 and which has spread to 6 States in the western pine area, with 146 certified tree farms, comprising 2,643,030 acres of privately owned forest lands by October 1948. Inspection and certification of tree farms are supervised by the association staff.

In recent years, there has been a marked tendency on the part of the industry to hold and acquire forest lands to be placed under management for growing forest crops. Employees of the association have helped in the formulation of practical plans for such long-range programs.

THE AMERICAN WALNUT MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION, since 1944, has encouraged widespread growth of walnut trees in the area from which its members derive their raw material. The work is headed by a forester.

The association has published a booklet, Growing Walnut for Profit. Industrial mills help collect walnuts, which are supplied to State nurseries, which, in turn, provide stratified walnuts to farmers and others for planting. State foresters in 15 States cooperate in this program, and it is estimated that, in 1948, up to 3 million more walnuts were planted than normally would have gone into the ground. The project is promoted through newspaper and radio publicity. Buyers of wood for member mills also stress the advantages of planting walnuts for future profit.

THE CALIFORNIA REDWOOD ASSOCIATION has not established a separate forestry division, but it has helped maintain close relationships between redwood operators and agencies like the State Division of Forestry and the University of California, both relating to forest practices and to research.

The association reports definite improvement in forest practices, particularly since 1935.

THE APPALACHIAN HARDWOOD MANUFACTURERS, INC., began a forestry program in 1945. Lumber manufacturers, coal operators, railroads, and other timberland owners are members.

Directed by a forester, the program is concerned chiefly with forestry procedures for its members and with State legislation favorable to better forest practices in the Appalachian area.

THE AMERICAN PAPER AND PULP ASSOCIATION appointed a forestry committee in 1938 to study the relationship of the industry to forestry, to collect and analyze data relating to forest resources and their uses, and to formulate the industry's views and recommendations with respect to any Federal forestry legislation. The formation of the committee was prompted by a special congressional committee investigation of the Nation's forest situation.

Through the years the forestry committee undertook to assemble information on forest-land ownership in the pulp and paper industry and the character of cutting programs employed by companies within the industry. The committee has always advocated a program of cooperation with Government and self-regulation by industry, as against Federal and State regulation of industrial forest lands.

To further better forestry practices on all woodlands, five regional subcommittees of the forestry committee were formed in 1947.

Pulp companies owned 14.8 million acres of commercial timberland in 1945, and, probably, through subsequent acquisitions, as much as 17 million acres in 1948. Additional acreage is owned in fee in certain Canadian Provinces by United States pulp mills.

Most pulp mills are cutting for continuous yield on their own lands and are educating contractors and other suppliers to the advantages of following good practices.

Foresters in company employ, because of increased freight rates, labor costs, and other factors, are analyzing the costs of pulpwood on the basis of transportation to varying distances. Those costs are being balanced against the costs of growing wood under intensive forest management near the mills. Frequently a large favorable balance rests with the production of wood near mills.

Under the stress of war conditions in 1945, management status of pulp companies, with respect to forest lands, was rated by the Forest Service (in The Management Status of Forest Lands in the United States, Forest Service 1946, Report 3—tables 2 and 16) as follows: 14.5 million of the 14.8 million acres were being operated with cutting practices rated 82 percent fair or better. The ratings were high, 3 percent; good, 30 percent; and fair, 49 percent.

For comparison of various types of ownership, forests under extensive or better management were rated as follows: Pulp company forests, 69.3 percent; all private holdings, 23 percent; public forests, 72.8 percent.

The rating of the pulp companies was three times as good as that of all private holdings and close to that of public forests, indicating that pulp and paper mills are thoroughly aware of the necessity for looking to their wood supply on a sustaining basis. The high investment in a pulp mill practically compels it.

THE SOUTHERN PULPWOOD CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION was organized by the pulp and paper industry in the South in 1939. Its member companies consume about 90 percent of all the pulpwood cut in the region. Its purpose was expressed thus:

"To formulate and promulgate by educational means a practical program of utilization and conservation of the forest resources of the South, in order to assure the prevention of a timber shortage with a consequent dire effect upon the pulp and other forest industries involving the welfare of the South and of the Nation, (a) by voluntary application of sound principles of forest practices recognized and accepted by the membership, and (b) by a program of education directed to forest owners and operators and to the public."

The services of the association have been made available to independent landowners, wood suppliers, and to the general public without any distinction. The services are concerned chiefly with growing more timber, preventing fires, and cutting wisely.

The association now employs 20 field men to carry on its educational activities and demonstrations in the field. The demonstrations are for wood growers, suppliers, and labor. They show proper cutting, tree planting, and improved methods of fire fighting and prevention. In 1947, although the program was new, the 245 demonstrations were attended by more than 4,000 persons. Association employees also check pulpwood cuttings on noncompany lands to determine results of the association's cutting standards.

Forestry training camps, sponsored by the association in 8 of the 10 States of its territory, have helped train farm youth in the fundamentals of forestry. Selected boys spend a week in camp to learn how to handle a timber crop on their own woodlands.

The association reports its activities by radio and newspapers and other publications, including a periodical, The Unit. It has published, and keeps current, Mechanizing Southern Forest Fire Fighting, which contains the latest information on the subject. It also published a Mechanization Manual. Among the films it has produced are several on pine planting, natural pine reseedings, and forest fire. Its portable exhibits and posters have been widely used.

TREES FOR TOMORROW, INC., is one of the more recent and unusual developments in industrial forestry. Its activities are confined to the Wisconsin River Valley.

An outgrowth of wartime campaigns to step up production of pulpwood, it is concerned, as its name implies, with growing tomorrow's trees. So successful was the tree-harvesting campaign in the area that a group of pulp and paper mills in the valley decided that, by somewhat similar methods, they could encourage better forest practices and planting of trees in their primary supply area of Wisconsin. So, on February 29, 1944, Trees for Tomorrow, Inc., was organized.

Its members include 10 pulp and paper mills, which own 350,000 acres of industrial forest land, on which 35 million trees have been planted. They are the Consolidated Water Power & Paper Co., Whiting Plover Paper Co., Mosinee Paper Mills Co., Marathon Corp., Wausau Paper Mills Co., Ward Paper Co., National Container Corp., Tomahawk Pulp Co., the Rhinelander Paper Co., and Flambeau Paper Co.

Its program is in two parts. The immediate phase, carried on in seven north-central Wisconsin counties, is directed to the owners of forest land. Since 1944, 2 million trees have been distributed to many private forest-land owners to plant unproductive acres. Planting sites are checked and survival count is taken to insure the best results. Since 1946, 25,000 acres of private woodlands have been mapped and management plans developed for them. A long-range program has adopted education methods, some of which are unique. Schools have been drawn into the project to the greatest possible extent. Each year, $2,500 is awarded in forestry scholarships. Help has been given to establish and manage 25 school forests. A Trees for Tomorrow conservation camp is held; in connection with it, an annual award of $200 is made to the outstanding boy in 4–H Club forestry projects.

The establishment of memorial forests is encouraged, partly to help create a conception of forestry among citizens who do not own forest lands. Assistance has been given to three such projects, totaling more than 11,000 acres. A monthly bulletin, Tree Tips, advances the general educational program.

In 1947, 1,265 persons from 67 Wisconsin counties and 42 States registered at the conservation camp, which opened May 12 and continued until October 24. It is operated by Trees for Tomorrow in cooperation with the United States Forest Service.

The organizers of Trees for Tomorrow, believing that Wisconsin's forest wealth can best be restored through understanding coordination between industry and other agencies in the field, have sought cooperation with representatives of the Forest Service, the State conservation department, and the University of Wisconsin Extension Service in shaping its policies and its activities. They recognize, as a major part of the problem, the necessity of creating a practical understanding by the public of the value and possibilities of the State's forest resources.

THE FOREST INDUSTRIES COUNCIL is a joint body, set up by various forest industries, to consider broad policy affecting all those industries. Its statement on forest policy declares:

"Permanent industries capable of producing continuous supplies of forest products are essential to the national welfare. The necessity for wise use of our forest resources in maintaining such industries and the communities dependent upon them is recognized. Having faith that private enterprise and initiative can provide the most effective management, use, and renewal of our Nation's forests, the Forest Industries Council pledges united leadership for betterment of America's forests, and the attainment of continuous forest production."

To further this policy, the Forest Industries Council has approved these objectives:

1. Extension of permanent and dependable protection against forest fire.

2. Adoption of forest practices, by all forest owners and operators, to insure continuous production of timber.

3. Encouragement of private ownership of forest lands that can be profitably managed, including a national land policy to include the sale and exchange of public lands in order to restore desirable lands to private ownership as well as to consolidate public holdings.

4. Encouragement of public ownership and management of forest lands incapable of producing enough wood to permit profitable private ownership.

5. Equalization of State and local taxes on forest lands.

6. Support of competent State forestry organizations to manage State-owned forest lands and to enforce State laws relating to privately owned forest lands.

7. Support of public regulation where necessary or desirable under State law.

8. Cooperation with public and private agencies to control forest insects and diseases.

9. More complete utilization of forest products.

Within the framework of the Forest Industries Council, various State committees have been formed under the name of Forest Industries Information Committees. Most of the committees, as their name implies, undertake informational work, but some have engaged in forestry promotional activities.

Among the latter are committees in Idaho, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. The Idaho committee was responsible for launching the Keep Idaho Green program by the Junior Chamber of Commerce in 1946. It has worked with 4–H Clubs to develop a tree-planting program in cooperation with the State extension service. Committee members have been active in such projects as tussock moth control and in legislative matters relating to forestry.

The Wisconsin committee initiated the Wisconsin system of industrial forests in 1944. It is somewhat similar to the Tree Farm program, but such areas are restricted to industrial holdings of 1,000 acres or more. Originally, 200,000 acres of managed lands were registered, but the acreage has increased to 411,000 acres. Most of the lands are in conifers for pulp consumption, but about 70,000 acres are in hardwoods. Most of the forestry matters of the Northern Hemlock and Hardwood Manufacturers Association are referred to the Wisconsin Forest Industries Information Committee, largely because of its broader representation.

In Minnesota, the Forest Industries Information Committee initiated the Keep Minnesota Green program, now directed by the State's Keep Green Committee. The Information Committee has conducted a continuing public forest-information program and sponsored State legislation relative to forestry subjects. Among such measures has been an act to permit the State to grow and sell forest nursery stock at cost, another to provide forestry aid to owners of small woods.

AMERICAN FOREST PRODUCTS INDUSTRIES, INC., as an instrument of education in forest subjects, started in 1941. Although an offshoot of the National Lumber Manufacturers Association, it recognized that all forest industries, whatever their products, have trees in common, and so its program included not only lumber manufacturers but makers of pulp and paper, plywood, and other forest products. In 1946, AFPI was reorganized to give it a status independent of any single type of forest industry. Its direction is vested in trustees representing the subscribers.

AFPI began with a national survey of public opinion, which revealed some public misconceptions regarding forests and forest products. Despite rapid advances in wood utilization, large segments of the public thought of wood as an outmoded, old-fashioned product, and of the forests as something belonging to the past. There was little realization that, through management and protection, our forest lands could be made to produce abundantly forever, and that, moreover, the raw materials harvested from forests were essential to national welfare. Conservation, in the minds of many, excluded utilization.

To help counter such impressions, the program started with these objectives:

"To make the American people aware of the fact that timber is a crop which forest-products industries are endeavoring to grow and protect continuously, to keep the people accurately informed about the constructive contributions which these industries are making by creating forest products through private enterprise, products which promote the economic, social, and defense progress of the Nation.

"To stimulate, throughout the forest-products industries themselves, further and continuing improvement in forest practices which are worthy of public approval."

By general educational methods, consisting of publicity, booklets, and motion pictures, the program sought to impress the public with certain characteristics of the forest resource, with the importance of wood as an industrial raw material, and with the steps being taken to use and to conserve the forest resource.

Educational materials were furnished to schools and other interested groups throughout the country. It was not long, however, before those essentially public relations activities broadened. By 1948, in addition to its general educational program, AFPI was undertaking these projects in the field of forestry:

1. The extension of the Keep America Green movement, for popular education in forest-fire prevention on a local basis.

2. The extension of the Tree Farm program, in areas where the project was not already organized or sponsored.

3. The initiation of local More Trees projects, designed to arouse the interest of woodland owners in better forest practices and to provide means for informing them.

The fact that Keep Green programs, organized in only 3 States in 1943, had expanded to 24 States in 1948 (with more being organized) is evidence of the effectiveness of this phase of AFPI's work during the intervening years. Similarly, from 1946 to 1948, AFPI helped to organize Tree Farm programs in 7 other States.

In both activities, assistance is given existing programs by supplies of materials and by counsel. In many instances, this has resulted in the formation of groups of interested citizens, localized even to communities within counties. Although such groups, which include Keep Green committees, are not industrial as such, they are largely the result of industry-sponsored programs for forest betterment.

A third AFPI forest program is the More Trees project. This most recent activity began in Alabama in 1948. Addressed primarily to owners of small woodlands, it both sells the idea of forest management for profit and seeks to bring practical fundamentals in farm forestry to woods owners.

Through an informal partnership between the American Forest Products Industries and the Alabama Forestry Council, representing public and private interests within the State, nearly every woodland owner was reached through advertising, publicity, booklets, motion pictures, and film strips. One idea is stressed: Good forest management pays. Field demonstrations and short courses in forestry are given. By the end of 1948 similar projects were operating in Virginia and New Hampshire, with others being planned.

All three projects—Keep Green, Tree Farms, More Trees—are collectively described as the Trees for America program. All three have one thing in common: They work for increased forest production on a strictly local basis. In no case does the American Forest Products Industries direct or manage them. It helps organize and assists them whenever assistance is wanted, but each program is locally sponsored and directed. Localizing such projects has the effect of drawing more people into partnership for forest progress; it is education by participation.

IN CONCLUSION: The contribution of these and other organized industrial groups to the forest progress of the United States is doubtless larger than the size of their staffs and extent of their expenditures would indicate. They came into the field of forest management in response to a definite need. Their influence upon memberships and associates has been direct and constant. Many private industries have established their own forestry departments as a result of the work of the association to which they contributed financially. Foresters in the employ of associations, in many instances, have introduced private companies to the practical advantages of a forestry program.

Progress in industrial forestry has been marked. In 1933, the Copeland Report estimated that less than 5 percent of cutting on privately owned lands was done with provision for the renewal of the forest. Thirteen years later, the Forest Service reported that cutting practices on all privately owned forest lands were 28 percent fair, 7 percent good, and 1 percent of high order. The improvement is more marked in ownerships of more than 50,000 acres, most of which are industrial forests. In that class of ownership, 39 percent of cutting is rated fair, 24 percent good, and 5 percent of high order.

Sustained-yield management had been applied to less than 1 percent of the privately owned forest area, the Copeland Report said in 1933. The 1946 report of the Forest Service considered that 22.4 percent of all private holdings were under extensive management, and 0.6 percent under intensive management. In this respect industrial holdings again made a relatively better record. The management status of lumber company holdings is rated as 32.2 percent extensive and 3.4 percent intensive. The management status of pulp company holdings is rated as 66.7 percent extensive and 2.6 intensive.

A direct comparison of the most recent Forest Service reappraisal with the Copeland Report is not statistically possible because methods, standards, and thoroughness of the two surveys are not identical. Yet findings indicate a striking change for the better in 13 years. Many factors contributed to that progress. Among those factors, the influence of industrial forestry associations looms large.

Correlation Of Grade Of Cutting With Sustained Yield, United States, 1945
	Percentage of acreage in each cutting class that was also on sustained yield
Ownership class	High order	Good	Fair
Public:	Percent	Percent	Percent
National forests	93	68	76
Other Federal	100	61	47
State and local	23	44	35
Private:
Large holdings	98	86	36
Medium holdings	68	46	16