Year: 1945
Type: article
Abstract: HE SUBJECT for this afternoon's discussion is described as "Forest Management Through Establishment of a Permanent Population in the Forest".Now, it may be bad tactics to start out with a flat con, tradiction, but I can't let that phrasing stand without challenge-in fact, it requires a frontal assault.The ease with which our subject title seem to have slipped by many of us, is to me really significant.Perhaps it may explain why we foresters find it so difficult to speed up the attainment of our own professional ob) jectives of sound forest management.Surely this is a perfect example of "putting the cart before the horse."It should have been phrased the other way around-"Population of the Forest Through the Establishment of Forest Management".Let us get down to fundamentals.Why do we want forest management of any kind?Is it not, in final analysis, for the primary purpose of building Canada into a great and prosperous nation?A prosperous nation, if.you like, so that we, as individuals, may prosper and may raise happy, thriving families, but nevertheless forest management is definitely not an end.It is only one required means to a great and worthy end-public welfare.We, as individual Canadians, as world citizens, are re4earning from these few years of struggle some of the simple truth that Mother Nature has for thousands of years demonstrated to those who have eyes to see and the ability' to reason.Nothing-no o n e i s se1f)sufficient: interde~endence is universal.. 3law.What has this, you may say, to do with forest settlement.Give me a little time and I will try to prove that it has a great deal to do with it.How does anyone ever achieve a worthwhile end?The answer may be trite, but it is worth repeating five times a day, every day, for ever.Clearly define the ultimate goal; then head for it, step by step, with fixed determina* tion.For two generations or more, here in Canada, foresters have preached and pleaded for sound management of forest lands, but as yet we have barely made ourselves heard beyond the first row or two of our audience of business men and general public.Why?I suppose at least twenty plausible reasons (I almost said excuses) might be put forward-business cycles, markets, ecop nomic conbtions-always economic conditions.
Source: The Forestry Chronicle
DOI: 10.5558/tfc21022-1
Author: A. J. Auden
Language: English
Topic: Forest Management and Policy
Subfield: Forestry
Domain: Life Sciences
SDG: Life on land
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2328952326