Day 056 - 28 Nov 94 - Page 31


     
     1        the area which may be 10 hectares, but still allowing
     2        regeneration from standing trees that remain in the
     3        surrounding forest.  Now, I think the practice is much more
     4        to leave individual trees right through the area of that
     5        coupe.
     6
     7   Q.   But the general practice for the last 30, 40 years has been
     8        in most of the countries, or all the countries, on your
     9        list that when the trees become mature (which, obviously,
    10        does not happen all at the same time) they are then logged;
    11        that is the aim of the plantation forest, is that correct?
    12        A.  Again it is easier to generalise but difficult to be
    13        correct with the generalisation, because if you take
    14        Scandinavia, Sweden and Finland, in particular, with
    15        average coups of two hectares, no more, it has long been
    16        their practice to allow natural regeneration.  That natural
    17        regeneration, obviously, depends on there being seed
    18        trees.  How they have done it; whether it has been close to
    19        an area cut or by leaving individual trees in the coupe has
    20        been a practice which has changed and evolved over the
    21        years.  I would have said they have been doing it for 10 or
    22        15 years, frankly.
    23
    24   Q.   Let us put it another way so as to get it simple:  In most
    25        of the plantations, managed plantations, for most of the
    26        time since the Second World War, say, there is a far less
    27        percentage -- possibly even as low as, you know, less than
    28        one per cent or something -- of over mature trees than
    29        would otherwise be in a forest that is just left to its own
    30        devices.  You know what I am trying to say though, if you
    31        could help me with saying what the situation is?
    32        A.  I am trying to answer it in a way which is accurate as
    33        well as constructive because, in effect, I have got figures
    34        to show that there are more trees over 100 years of age and
    35        more trees over 140 years of age in Finnish forests now
    36        than there were 10 years ago.  Now, these statistics are
    37        produced by a Forest Service that has been surveying this
    38        problem, knowing that environmental concern about mature
    39        trees was becoming more and more real.
    40
    41   Q.   But forgetting Finland and Sweden specifically, can we say
    42        that throughout the majority of the countries which you
    43        have identified, or for the majority of time since the
    44        Second World War, the practice has not been to allow trees
    45        to develop beyond maturity?
    46        A.  In the case -----
    47
    48   Q.   Would that be a fair summary of the situation?
    49        A.  One has to say "yes" and "no" because there are certain
    50        areas where all the forestry resource which is supplying 
    51        their industry is, in fact, from mature forest, and that 
    52        particularly applies to West Coast America and Canada where 
    53        existing forest is the current resource.
    54
    55        The replantations that have occurred as areas have been
    56        cleared have not yet matured, and it will not be for
    57        another 20 or 30 years that that part of the world can be
    58        dependent, not on the original forest, but on plantation
    59        forest as its resource.  As far as the UK is concerned, our
    60        planting (which has actually doubled the amount of forest

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