The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. THURSDAY, JUNE 29, 1911.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3256, 29 June 1911, Page 4

The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. THURSDAY, JUNE 29, 1911.

The efforts of tile New -Zealand Government in regard to re-afforestation are attracting a good ueai oi ravoraoie comment in. Australia. As lias been the case in most other countries, there has been destruction of large areas of timber in various parts of the Commonwealth in the course of the work of developing lands for stock raising and agricultural pursuits. “There is no gainsaying the fact,” says the “Pastoralists’ Review” for example, “that millions of trees were killed unnecessarily and with a piece of ruthlessness which amounted to vandalism. The trees 1 that have been destroyed should 1 now he affording shade aud shelter. Millions of acres have been left exposed to the fierce heat of slimmer and the bitter winds of winter.” But- the various States have not yet fully realised the need of checking this policy of unnecessary destruction and of substituting for it one that will gradually replace the timber that has been lost. To this end the “Review” advocates a general policy of tree planting carried out by individual landholders. “If. such ivcre done (it declares) it Avould in a few decades create a wonderful change in the appearance of the country, and it Avould at the same time be laying the foundations of a national asset. Then it proceeds to point out what Ncav Zealand has done in regard to the problem. “The New Zealand Government,” it says, “has done a great deal in- the matter of.tree planting. The raihvay 'station reserves throughout the Dominion have been

A Valuable Asset.

turned into plantation,? of useful timber, millions of trees have been planted l at Government expense- by prison labor. In the Waiotapir Valley, near Rotorua, prisoners have planted 12,000,000 tree? on 4600 acres of. otherwise waste land. This work has been done at a cost of £8965, and it is estimated that it-would have cost at least £25,000 if done by free labor. So far the total expenditure on tree planting in New Zealand, by prison labor, amounts to £38,742, and for this sum a total area of 9835 acres has been planted with 23,586,000 trees. The value of "this work is, of course, prospective, but all these trees are growing into- a national asset. In countries where the timber Has been destroyed in the process of development the natural corollary is replanting.” The “Review” goes on to say that the question is surely worthy of far more publicity and attention than it gets in Australia at the present time. It adds: : A part from the ever-increasing value of good timber, there are many instances in the world where localities have been transformed and productivity increased by the establishment of forests; One instance is afforded by the Department of Lands in France. At the close of the eighteenth century about 2,500,000 acres in that region were little- mere than shifting sand dunes and diseasebreeding marshes. At the present time the same lands are among the richest, most productive,’ and healthful in all France, and the change has , been brought about by intelligent cultivation of pine forests. Even the character of the climate of the region has been ameliorated-, and it has become mild ; and" balmy.”