Philippine Offici.l Discusses Lumber Conditions

Ln The Lslands

A lunchecn meeting was called by the Philippine Mahogany Association on Tuesday, September 13 at the Jonathan Club, Los Angeles, to honor Florencio Tamesis, Director of Forestry of the Philippine Republic and Dean of the School of Forestry at Manila. About fifty were present, including Philippine mahogany importers, builders, furniture manufacturers, bankers, architects and members of the shipping industry.

N{r. Tamesis rvill be in this country about a month and 'il/as one of the speakers at the annual convention of the National Hardwood Lumber Association at Chicago on September 26.

Frank J. Connolly, president of the Western Hardwood Lumber Co., Los Angeles, introduced Mr. Tamesis who discussed the lumber situation in the Philippines. His talk follorvs :

"I am indeed grateful for the privilege you accorded to me in meeting you this afternoon. I certainly enjoyed immensely your company and appreciate this wonderful opportunity for which I wish to thank you from the bottom of my heart. I will be happy to report to my Government this spirit of cordiality. f can assure you it will be greatiy appreciated.

"Today your country and my country are experiencing the period of readjustment as the aftermath of the recent world war. How best we succeed is a matter of speculation. But there seems to be an indication that these obstacles can be met through better understanding of the different factors affecting the various channels of industry and government. What concerns my people ties up to a mutual and better understanding with the people of this country.

"You r'r,ill recall that for over 40 years we were under vour tutelage, and are only 4 years old as an independent nation. In our endeavor to meet our national obligations we naturally seek trade expansions and development, and realizing our former tie up with your industry and economy, we now naturally look forward to reestablishing that connection with the hope of perpetuating better trade understanding than we had enjoyed before.

"At the outset, I want to tell you that I have nothing to sell you personally, but I have under my charge possibly the largest stands of hardwood timber in the world that is easily accessible and amenable to modern mechanical extractions and conversions at costs comparably reasonable for woods of similar classification.

"As you know, the Philippines is a group of some 7,083 islands and has an area of 115,600 square miles, or only about 7/3 ot r/a of. the State of California, with a population of over 19 million people. Among these islands there are 11 large ones that have commercial timber and there is where we started carrying our lumber industry since the American Occupation. American pioneers were not slow in recognizing the value of our forests and soon after the Government was estabiished, introductions of mechanical logging and conversions were placed in operation. The lumber industry has developed so rapidly that at the outbreak of the Pacific War, it was playing an important role in the Philippine economy and social welfare. It ranked {ourth in the value of production, second in the number of iaborers employed, third in the monthly wages, and fifteenth in the number of establishments. There was sufficient lumber for home consumption and export trade was developed and there were established foreign contacts rnostly with this country. During our forced isolation, rve have had very little use of our timber resources, although the Japanese armed forces did their darndest to produce lumber for the war efforts. It did not succeed..but instead