Page:Indian Journal of Economics Volume 2.djvu/687

INDIAN FUEL PROBLEM 66? growing on Government waste-land. It is noteworthy ?ha? ?rees like bsbul growing on fields are sp? to be destroyed by ?he progress of cultivation, and alm os? all ?hese eases, exeep? ?he plantations, ?he destruction is more steady ?hsn natural or artificial reproduction. ? From ?he graph I am exhibiting to show ?he distribution of ares in British India, i? will be seen how the sereage from which such supple- mentsry fuel supplies can be derived is either inelss- tie or shows s shrinkage. with the Forest officers before the The same is the case aras, and the evidence of Forest Industrial Com?ssion was almost unanimous in denying the possibility of getting much more ou? of our forests ?hsn we no v? do. Afrorests- tion is unpopular, and there is always a tendency for administrations to disforest lands, and to allow culti- vation to be carried on within forest reserves. The practice too, which allowiog fnel and still timber obtains in many to be extracted places, of by private agency, either on the payment of contract-prices or of seigniorage, has exploitation of led to wasteful and even forests. We have also the ruinous unideal Forester, who regards his function mainly as the pro- duction of revenue, even to the detriment of the forests in his charge. ? It may not be necessary to press the further in order to show how, because been largely drawing on non-(?overnment point any we have sources of ,t For & rotation which would leave & fuel plant?tio. n in undiminished strength, ten years will be required In the case _of C?uMqna and Cuhe_w, ? twenty-five ye? in.the e?se of B?bul and Eucalyptus. The l?t e?sorbs the w?tsr in subsoil springs so thorougM.y. that It l?- not to b?_ reoomm. e_?sd f_or plantations in places where the subsoff_ spnngs ?rs al?t to dry UP in ?,ummer. Fuel tree? must &train & 'girth' of st least tw.enty-elght inches before they mm s It is hardly necessary to emphasize .u?.duly the dauber to sSrloulture, and therefore to the oouutry's-food supplies likely to resull from the destruotior,, firewood, we have allowed the serious and impending shortage in. wood-fuel to escape our vigilant attention..