Research Publications

Farm and Forest: Which Way to Sustainability

This paper addresses the different conservation policies governing timber versus all other crops. As a result there are two different institutional approaches to conservation - one for forests and one for farms. The first section reviews conservation policies for forestry from 1900 to 1930 contending that the federal agency had exclusively served private landowners to assist them in better timber management. The next section covers 1930 to 1960, addressing the changes in both forest and farm policy due to the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl, adding programs for both through the New Deal and struggling with turf wars. In the Environmental Era from 1960 to 1985, the paper addresses the subsiding interagency turf battles, the approach with which the agencies handled the depletion of forests due to the war machine and changing public opinion of forestry from viewing it as farming to seeing forestry as an industry with "big business" controlling the policies affecting timber and it's products. In the New Environmental Era from 1985 to 2000, the paper talks about the emergence of the soil and water conservation, including wetland protection, conservation compliance, etc., to slowly eliminating subsidies. The report concludes with an explanation for the decline of landownership of forests and how to manage forests in a sustainable manner as a question for the next century.

http://aftresearch.org/research/resource/publications/wp/wp98-7.html