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Forestry is the management of trees and forests for environmental or economic gain. The United Kingdom,〔The United Kingdom (sometimes abbreviated to UK) is a political unit (specifically a country), the British Isles is a geographical unit (the archipelago lying off the northwest coast of Europe), and Great Britain is the name of the largest of those islands. In this article "Great Britain" is sometimes abbreviated to "Britain". The adjective "British" can mean either the political or the geographical entity.〕 being in the British Isles, is ideal for tree growth, thanks to its mild winters, plentiful rainfall, fertile soil and hill-sheltered topography. Growth rates for broadleaved (hardwood) trees exceed those of mainland Europe, while conifer (softwood) growth rates are three times those of Sweden and five times those of Finland. In the absence of people, much of Great Britain would be covered with mature oaks, except for Scotland. Although conditions for forestry are good, trees do face damage threats arising from fungi, parasites and pests.〔.〕 Nowadays, about 12.9% of Britain's land surface is wooded and this area is increasing. The country's supply of timber was severely depleted during the First and Second World Wars, when imports were difficult, and the forested area bottomed out at under 5% of Britain's land surface in 1919. That year, the Forestry Commission was established to produce a strategic reserve of timber. However, the recovery is still very much in progress. Other European countries average from 25% to 37% of their area as woodland.〔.〕〔.〕〔''Rural Focus: Forestry Policy'', Estates Gazette, 28 July 2012, pages 56-57. ISSN 9770014124214〕 Of the of forest in Britain, around 30% is publicly owned and 70% is in the private sector.〔In fact, this is not easy to establish. There is no complete register of who owns land in the United Kingdom. (.) HM Land Registry records purchases by way of conveyance, but where land has not changed hands since the Land Registry was established in 1862, no records exist. Two attempts have been made to take a complete census of ownership (the Domesday Book in 1086 and a census in 1873) but both contain significant omissions and are extremely dated besides; and much of the forested land is on long-established estates where ownership is not recorded on any register that can be examined. Often-quoted figures for England come from the Forestry Commission, National Inventory of Woodland and Trees (1998), which claims the breakdown is as follows: Private: Personal: 47.1% Business (including pension funds) 14.3% Public: Forestry Commission 21.8% Other central government: 2.7% Local authority 6% Charity 6.7% Forestry or timber business 0.7% 〕 More than 40,000 people work on this land. Broadleaves account for 29% of Britain's woodlands, the rest being conifers, but considering only England, the figures are 55% broadleaf and 45% conifer. Britain's native tree flora comprises 32 species, of which 29 are broadleaves. Britain's industry and populace uses at least 50 million tonnes of timber a year. More than 75% of this is softwood, and Britain's forests cannot supply the demand; in fact, less than 10% of the timber used in Britain is home-grown. Paper and paper products make up more than half the wood consumed in Britain by volume.〔〔.〕〔.〕 In October 2010, the new coalition government of the UK suggested it might sell off around half the Forestry Commission-owned woodland in the UK. A wide variety of groups were vocal about their disapproval, and by February 2011, the government abandoned the idea. Instead, it set up the Independent Panel on Forestry led by Rt Rev James Jones, then the Bishop of Liverpool. This body published its report in July 2012. Among other suggestions, it recommended that the forested portion of England should rise to 15% of the country's land area by 2060.〔 ==History== Throughout most of British history, the trend has been to create farmland at the expense of forest. Furthermore, variations in the Holocene climate have led to significant changes in the ranges of many species. This makes it complex to estimate the likely extent of natural forest cover. For example, in Scotland four main areas have been identified: oak dominated forest south of the Highland Line, Scots Pine in the Central Highlands, hazel/oak or pine/birch/oak assemblages in the north-east and south-west Highlands, and birch in the Outer Hebrides, Northern Isles and far north of the mainland. Furthermore, the effects of fire, human clearance and grazing probably limited forest cover to about 50% of the land area of Scotland even at its maximum. The stock of woodland declined alarmingly during the First World War〔see e.g. The Brecon & Radnor Express June 13, 1918 for local concerns〕 and "a Forestry Subcommittee was added to the Reconstruction Committee to advise on policy when the war was over. The Subcommittee, better known as the Acland Committee after its chairman Sir A. H. D. Acland, came to the conclusion that, in order to secure the double purpose of being able to be independent from foreign supplies for three years and a reasonable insurance against a timber famine, the woods of Great Britain should be gradually increased from three million acres to four and three quarter millions at the end of the war".〔Jan Willem Oesthook, The Logic of British Forest Policy, 1919-1970〕 Following the Acland Report of 1918 the Forestry Commission was formed in 1919 to meet this need. State forest parks were established in 1935.〔Tivy, Joy "The Bio-climate" in .〕〔 Emergency felling controls had been introduced in the First and Second World Wars, and these were made permanent in the Forestry Act 1951. Landowners were also given financial incentives to devote land to forests under the Dedication Scheme, which in 1981 became the Forestry Grant Scheme. By the early 1970s, the annual rate of planting exceeded per annum. Most of this planting comprised fast-growing conifers. Later in the century the balance shifted, with fewer than per annum being planted during the 1990s, but broadleaf planting actually increased, exceeding per year in 1987. By the mid-1990s, more than half of new planting was broadleaf.〔〔.〕 In 1988, the Woodland Grant Scheme replaced the Forestry Grant Scheme, paying nearly twice as much for broadleaf woodland as conifers. (In England, the Woodland Grant Scheme was subsequently replaced by the English Woodland Grant Scheme, which operates six separate kinds of grant for forestry projects.)〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=English Woodland Grant Scheme )〕 That year, the Farm Woodlands Scheme was also introduced, and replaced by the Farm Woodland Premium Scheme in 1992. In the 1990s, a programme of afforestation resulted in the establishment of Community Forests and the National Forest, which celebrated the planting of its seven millionth tree in 2006. As a result of these initiatives, the British Isles are one of a very few places in the world where the stock of forested land is actually increasing, though the rate of increase has slowed since the turn of the millennium. England Rural Development Programme is the current overarching grants scheme that includes money for forested land within it. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Forestry in the United Kingdom」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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