A Brief History of Forestry.

By the time this new era had arrived there was probably little valuable forest worthy of the name left, except in the inaccessible mountain districts.

1. Forest Conditions

Although certain districts, like Attica, were already practically denuded in Plato’s time, there is little doubt that originally the whole of Greece with small exceptions was a continuous forest. The destruction of the forest, protected by thousands of gods and nymphs in holy groves, proceeded slowly under the regime of the ancient Greeks, until the fanaticism of the Christian religion led to a war against these pagan strongholds, and the holy groves were reduced by axe and fire. Turkish misrule for centuries, over-taxation, reckless cutting, extensive herding of goats and sheep, and fires have reduced the forest area until now it occupies only 12 or 14 per cent. of the land area (25,000 square miles). In 1854, a survey developed about 2 million acres of woodlands (probably an excessive figure) for the now 2.5 million people, while 67 per cent. of the surface is a useless waste, and only 20 per cent. under cultivation, so that the general aspect of the country is desolate. The many islands are entirely deforested, and so are the seashores. “Where in olden times dense shady poplars stood, now only infertile sand and dreary rock waste remain.”

The forest in northern and middle Greece is confined to the two rugged mountain ranges with numerous spurs which run parallel, north and south, with Mt. Olympus (nearly 9,000 feet) and Mt. Pindus (6,000 feet) the highest elevations. The large fertile plains of Thessaly and Boeotia are forestless. So is the large Arcadian plateau of the Peloponnesus, and the other smaller, hot but fertile plains and plateaus. The most valuable conifer forest is found on the higher ranges between the 2,500 and 5,000 foot level, below the snow-clad mountain tops, where especially two species of fir, Abies Apollinis and Abies reginæ Amaliae (a species remarkable for its sprouting habit), with other firs and several species of Juniperus and Cupressus, form sometimes extensive forests. Other common trees are chestnut, sycamore, several species of oak and poplar, and, on the coast, Pinus halepensis.

The firs occupy about 35 per cent. of the forest area, oaks and deciduous forest 45 per cent. Among the forest products which are exported, we find galls, vermillion and sumach prominent.

It is believed that Greece in ancient times was more fertile than it is now, and that the deterioration is due to deforestation. Undoubtedly soil conditions favored such deterioration, for, with the exception of the Pindus range, which is composed of metamorphic rock, a poor, dry limestone is characteristic of the country except where fertile, alluvial and diluvial deposits cover it in valleys along the coast. The climate is, however, so favorable that even the poor soil would readily reclothe itself if left alone. The winters are short, hardly three months, and with hardly any snow or ice except on the high mountains, making the vegetative period nine months; and, with temperature ranges from 20 to 106 degrees F.; rainfall average 400 mm.; the summers, to be sure, rainless and dry, but the other seasons humid, somewhat less than in middle Europe, rapid growth is the result of these conditions. But the continued pasturing of goats and sheep – some six million – prevents any natural reforestation. Increased taxation on this industry has had no effect, and the practice of permitting the people to gather dry wood for fuel is an incentive for making dry wood by setting fires, which also serve to improve the pasture; perhaps nowhere are forest fires more frequent, in spite of heavy penalties. That a baneful influence on the water condition and river flow has been the result is historically demonstrated by Chloros.13

In the mountains some fine and quite extensive bodies of fir still exist, lack of transportation having preserved them. Elsewhere the rights of user, and the herding of goats are so well established that reforms appear, indeed, difficult.

Firewood, 3 loads for each person, supposed to be taken from the dead or otherwise useless trees, and small dimension material is free to all. For the right to cut workwood, the government charges a tax of 25 to 30 per cent. of the value of the material, the price for this being annually determined. On the material cut in private forests, the government also levies a tax of from 12 to 18 per cent. of its value. This pernicious system of promiscuous cutting leads to the most wasteful use imaginable, not only high stumps, but large amounts of good material are left in the woods so that it is estimated that hardly 50 per cent. of what is cut is really utilized. The cut, as far as the tax gives a clue to it, amounts to around 2.7 million cubic feet workwood, but with the firewood included it was estimated that near 90 million cubic feet are cut annually. Importation to the amount of 1.5 million dollars, mostly from Austria and Roumania, makes up the deficit in work material, especially for the box factories which manufacture the packages for the large export of currants, some 2 million boxes. The tax during the decade from 1862 to 1871 produced an annual income of $600,000, a little less in 1895.

The forest has been from olden times, and is now almost entirely, State property (some 80 or 90 per cent.) and in nearly all the remaining, private, communal and cloister property the State has a partial ownership or supervision. The waste land of probably 3 million acres extent also belongs to the State, the whole State property covering over 30 per cent. of the land area.

2. Development of Forest Policies

A first definite attempt to regulate matters was made by Otho, who being a German, took a personal interest in this forest property, and instituted for each province forest inspectors (dasarchys) under one chief inspector, with forest guards, to prevent devastation by fire and theft. The mistake was made of employing in these positions superannuated Bavarian army officers, who were merely a burden on the treasury. No management or even regular fellings were attempted. The population could, as before, supply its needs upon permits, always granted, from the governor of the province, one of the forest guards being supposed to vise these, and to see that the wood was properly employed, not, however, to supervise the cutting.

In 1877, further legislation was had, instituting in the Ministry of Finance, a forest inspector, technically trained, with two assistant inspectors, also technically trained, to superintend the outside work. A forest survey was begun in 1879, but interrupted in 1880 for lack of funds and personnel. The same law placed the duty of guarding the State property in the hands of the general police or gendarmerie, 50 officers and some 340 guards, and during the fire danger (June to October) 110 more, being detailed for this service under direction of the Minister of War. The pernicious permit system, however, was continued.

Dr. Chloros, who obtained his education in Germany, became finally Forest Director and was responsible for securing further legislation in 1888, the object of which was, as a first step towards improvement, to survey and delimit and round off the State property. It provided that enclaves, and all absolute forest soil was to be expropriated. If no amicable agreement with the owner could be reached, the price was to be determined by the net yield which had been obtained from the property during the last five years, capitalized at 5 per cent. No attempts, however, at an efficient organization or change of the destructive permit system were made.

By general law, the State has the right to surveillance of private property, although the extent of this right is not fully defined. The government may take for its own use, by paying for it, upwards of one-sixth of the annual cut; it collects a tax of 12 to 18 per cent. for all woodwork cut; it forbids the pasturing of woods that have been burned within 10 years, and obliges all owners of over 1200 acres to employ forest guards. This and other interference with property rights naturally acts as deterrent to private forest management. A notable exception is the small private royal forest property near Athens, which, since 1872 under a Danish forester, appears to have been managed under forestry principles.

A thorough re-organization of the forest service was effected in 1893, when 20 district foresters were employed, the number of forest inspectors was increased to four, and a regular Division of Forestry was instituted in the Finance Department. The general police or gendarmerie was continued as forest guards. Until a native personnel could be educated by sending young men to Germany, foreigners were to be employed for the making of working plans.

Yet in 1896, the then Director of the Forest Department, a lawyer, still complains of the absence of a proper organization and of any personnel with forestry knowledge. Apparently no progress had been made. In that year, however, the gendarmerie was to be replaced by forest guards (52 superior and 298 subaltern) who were to be appointed from graduates of a special secondary school, which had been instituted at Vytina some two years before. This replacement could, of course, not be effected at once, since hardly more than 25 men could be graduated annually; hence even this improvement in the lower class police would not be completed for six or eight years. No steps had been taken to educate officers for the higher grades, and in this direction, propositions merely were discussed.

In 1899, a change in the permit system was made, but hardly for the better, justices of the peace being empowered, under certain conditions, to issue such permits. Nor do we find in 1901 anything more than expressions of good wishes, and desire for further legislation, besides some attempts at popular education through the formation of tree-planting associations under the patronage of the Crown Princess. In 1905 no change in conditions are reported. Forest fires still continue as a common occurrence.

While the government makes efforts to improve conditions, the indifference, stupidity, cupidity, and malevolence of the people, and the long established abuses prevent rapid progress at reform.

ITALY

Bolletino ufficiale per l’amminstrazione forestale Italiana.

Direzione generale dell’ Agricoltora: Relazione interno all’ amministrazione dei boschi domaniali inalienabili.

Various essays by Prof. Vittorio Perona of Vallambrosa in German magazines; notably in Allgemeine Forst- und Jagdzeitung, 1882, 1888.

Archeologia forestale. Dell’ antica storia e giurisprudenza forestale in Italia. A. Di Berenger. 1859.

Maffei, Revista forestale.

Italy. By Prof. W. Deeke. 1904.

Il rimboschimento dello Appennino meridionale, by Luigi Savastano, 1893. An exceedingly well written popular treatise on silviculture, which gives also briefly insight into forest conditions and forest practices.

I boschia e la nostra politica Italiana, by Bertagnolli, 1889.

Italia moderna. 1904, article by Lunadoni.

The efforts to secure improvement in the treatment of forest resources have been more active and strenuous in Italy than in Greece. They were induced especially by the urgent need of protecting watersheds, the rivers throughout Italy having been turned into torrents by deforestation. But, owing to the weakness of the government and to poverty, the actual execution of the very good laws has lagged behind. Indeed, while ample legislation has been enacted, the people, overburdened with debt, and needing the small income that can be derived from pasturing or renting the pasture in the woods, make it difficult to carry on any reform, and the enforcement of the laws has again and again led to serious trouble. “Forestry is a sore point in the national economy of Italy, as it involves sacrifice of money and time.” Italy, therefore, is still in the transition period from forestal rapine to forest culture.

Densely populated (33 million on 110,600 square miles), with fully one-fifth of its area unproductive, or at least unused, and one-quarter of this almost or quite beyond redemption, no country offers better opportunities for studying the evil effects of deforestation on soil and waterflow. As a result of the combination of geology (slates and limestones), topography (steep slopes), climate, and forest devastation or destruction, mainly by pasturage of goats (two million), the Italian rivers are invariably flooded in March and mostly dry in summer; the melting of the snow coinciding with the heavy spring rains turns them into raging torrents (fiumare), silting over the fertile lands in the valleys and occasional landslides in the mountain country, where extensive tracts are nearly bare of vegetation. Especially the rivers around Bologna, which in 1897 again caused damage in excess of one million dollars, are dreaded.

1. Forest Conditions

Situated similarly to Greece as regards accessibility and climate, and similarly torn by wars and political strife, and in unstable conditions for centuries, Italy has in proportion to population, if not to area, reduced her forest resources even more than Greece; less than one-third of an acre per capita remains, with a total of somewhat over twelve million acres, or about 17 per cent. of the land area, and this includes much useless brushland, over 2 million acres. Apparently, if the uncertain statistics may be relied upon, a reduction of several million acres has taken place even since 1870. Some 15 million acres of waste land and swamps offer ample opportunity for increasing this forest area without infringing on the 42 million acres of usefully employed agricultural soil.

Of the forest area, 25 per cent. is to be found in the Alps, about 50 per cent. on the Apennines, the one mountain range which forms the backbone of Italy; less than one-quarter is distributed over the plains, and the small balance is found on the islands, especially Sicily, which is a hill and mountain country, once magnificently wooded, now largely denuded (4 per cent. wooded), and on Sardinia, which, with nearly 45 per cent. under forest, is the best wooded part of Italy, although the condition of the forest is here no better than elsewhere.

With the exception of the slopes of the Alps (2.5 million acres of spruce, fir, beech, larch), and the tops of the Apennines and remote plateaus (4.5 million acres), and of a few special places on which now and then even magnificent remnants of virgin forest may be found – lack of transportation having preserved them – most of the area is occupied by miserable brush forest, coppice or else open forest with scattered trees among a shrub undergrowth of thorns, hazel and chestnut (called macchia, i.e., chaparral), so that most Italians have never seen a real forest. Nevertheless, Italy is by no means as treeless as this condition of forest would imply, for trees (poplar, ash, elm) are dotting the plains and slopes, planted for vine supports and boundaries, unshapely through pollarding and lopping the branches for firewood. Olive and chestnut groves on the hills (of the former 2 million acres, of the latter over 400,000 acres planted for the fruit), and 8.5 million acres in vineyards add to the wooded appearance of the country and to the wood supply. The annual product of firewood from these planted trees is estimated at 6 million cords.

On the sand dunes and near the seashore, especially in the marshes, the Maritime, the Aleppo Pine, and the umbrella-shaped Pinus pinea, and picturesque Cypresses are sometimes found in small groves, while the calcareous hills in this region up to 1200 feet are studded with olives, cork and evergreen oak. Osier growing is here also quite extensively practiced. In the mountains, above the 2700 foot level, conifer forest, composed of Pinus silvestris and laricio, and Abies pectinata, has been reduced to less than 7 per cent. of the whole, mixed conifer and deciduous forest represents 4 per cent., the bulk being deciduous forest of oak (several species) and beech, with chestnut. Forty-eight per cent. of the forest area is in coppice (ceduo), and of the 52 per cent. of high forest, the bulk is managed under selection system (a scelta), a small part under clearing system (ad alto fusto), although management can hardly be said to exist except in small groves.

That supply of workwood is insufficient for the needs of the population, and is decreasing, is attested by the fact that the importations more than doubled in the decade from 1892 to 1903 to near 14 million dollars, 80 per cent. of which was saw material, in addition to 2 million dollars of wood manufactures, while nearly 5 million dollars’ worth was exported in the last named year, mostly cork, casks, thin box-boards, olive wood manufactures, and charcoal. No better picture of the forest conditions can be had than by a statement of the home production, which, in 1886, (last official data) was placed at 48 million cubic feet of workwood, valued at 3.4 million dollars, 223 million cubic feet firewood, valued at 4.1 million, 106 million cubic feet charcoal, worth 3.6 million, and by-products to the large amount of 6.4 million dollars, altogether a little less than 17.6 million dollars. Firewood and charcoal, which represent over 80 per cent. of the product, are, of course, furnished by coppice, and in addition by the pollarded material, almost the only fuel to be had.

The ownership of the forest area is for the greater part private (53 per cent.) and communal (over 43 per cent.), the State owning a little over 400,000 acres, less than 4 per cent. The State property being so small, supervision of communal and private forest has become the policy.

The State forest is of two classes, the alienable, under the Department of Finance, the larger part, about 375,000 acres, and the inalienable, so declared by law of 1871, which was then about 115,000 acres, and was placed under a forest administration in the Department of Agriculture; but of this about 20 per cent. is not forest, and even in 1896, some of this small area was sold so that now only 40,000 acres remain. This area is to serve for demonstration of model management, and to supply government needs. Beech and oak with fir, pine and larch, mostly in timber forest, characterize this property, which is managed mostly in selection system. Curiously enough, in 1888, the difficulty of disposing advantageously of the old timber is complained of, due to lack of means of transportation. The personnel of the administration consists of a central bureau with one Inspector General, three Inspectors, and a Council. For each province, and in some cases for two or more provinces together, an Inspector with several Sub-inspectors and a number of guards or brigadieri are charged with the management of the State property and the enforcement of the forest laws.

2. Development of Forest Policy

For centuries, since the fall of the Roman Empire (476 A.D.) until the end of the eighteenth century, Italy has been the victim of war and strife with neighbors or within its borders, being divided into numberless commonwealths, almost each city being independent. Hence, no economic improvements could take place until, under the influences of the French Revolution, the regeneration period began. Not, however, until the seven or eight states, which the Congress of Vienna (1815) had established, were moulded into one united Italy under Victor Emmanuel, during the years 1859 to 1870, could an effective reconstruction be inaugurated.

It is true that some of the republics in earlier times paid attention to their forest property. Notably in Venice, old forest ordinances14 date back to 697, and, in 1453, a regular forest administration was instituted, especially to take care of the large forest area in Istria and Dalmatia, which fell into the hands of the Venetians about 1420. A tolerably conservative management continued here until the beginning of the eighteenth century when, in consequence of political complications, supervision became lax, and devastation began which continued through the century, leaving to the new century, and finally to the Austrians, the legacy of the Karst (see p. 173).

Florence too, managed to prevent the deforestation of the summit of her mountains until the beginning of the eighteenth century, and in other republics, kingdoms and duchies, similar efforts at forest administration existed. Yet Genoa, which in Strabo’s time was the principal timber market of Italy, had by 1860 nearly all its mountain slopes denuded.

Before the general legislation for all Italy was enacted there were at least a dozen laws in operation in the various provinces; in Lombardy, the law of 1811; in Naples, the law of 1826; in Rome, of 1827; in Umbria, of 1805; in Bologna, of 1829; in Tuscany, of 1829; in Piedmont, of 1833; in Sardinia, of 1851; etc. If these had been heeded much better conditions would have been inherited by the new kingdom.

With the arrival of a national spirit, many schemes for the promotion of forestry and of forest policy were discussed. The academies of Florence, Milan, Modena, Palermo, and Pesaro offered premiums for reforesting of mountains, and called for popular treatises on silviculture. A forestry journal came into being, furthering the propaganda. In 1860 a very well written account of “Present Conditions of Forestry and Production of Sulphur in Sicily,” a collection of reports, was published by Shiro. In 1860 also, an investigation of forest conditions in each province was ordered by royal decree, and propositions for their improvement were called for, which led to legislative proposals, introduced in 1862, and legislation enacted in 1863.

The law of 1863 still treated each province independently: forest inspectors for each province, and for Naples an Inspector General, with district foresters and a large number of forest guards were appointed.

Another law, applicable only to certain parts of the Kingdom, was enacted in 1874, intended to check the progress of deforestation and prevent turning waste woodlands into pasture; these absolute forest soils were to be reforested within five years. The law remained a dead letter, yet it is still in force in part, with modifications enacted in 1886.

The final unification of the country as far as legislative unity is concerned, was completed in 1877, and in that year the first general forest law for all Italy was also enacted.

This law, which has mainly in view the protective influence of forest cover as a factor in the public welfare, leaving all private property not falling under the character of protection forest entirely free, established provincial forest commissions – conservation boards – unpaid, who were to enact rules and regulations best adapted to their localities. The Board of Commissioners consisted of the prefect of the province, ex-officio president; an inspector of forests, the technical officer who administers the government property; an engineer appointed by the governor; and three members chosen by the provincial council; in addition, each communal council was to send one member to take part in the deliberations of the board as far as his particular commune was interested.

By this law the country is divided into two sections vertically, namely the territory above the limit of chestnut, and that below this limit, the latter representing the farming country, the territory above being unfit for agricultural use. To the former the restrictions of the law apply as a rule (terreni soggetti al vincolo forestale– ban forest), to the latter, as exception, namely where the removal of forest or brush cover might cause landslides, or affect stream flow or health conditions unfavorably. The chestnut limit naturally varies in different parts, but, generally speaking, lies between 1,800 and 2,000 feet elevation. The determination of these areas was to be made by the provincial forest committees, and it is significant to note that in these the State forest administration did not have the majority.

The territory under restriction, was in 1887, after various revisions, established as comprising 7.5 million acres of forest and 2.5 million acres of brush and waste, nearly 71 % of the forest area being thus placed under restriction; leaving 2.5 million acres of forest and over 2 million of brush and waste outside the working of the law; these latter areas are left entirely without restrictions, except as general police regulations apply. The execution of the law and regulations is left to the State Forest Department with an organization of forest guards (some 3,000 in 1883), appointed by the prefect of the province with the advice of the forestry commission, but acting under the State forest administration. Their pay was to come to the extent of two-thirds from the communes, the other third from the provincial treasurer.