WORKING GROUP 4 
FRANCIS 
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borings or from the stumps of felled trees, cannot be undertaken. The only 
solution is to carry out investigations into incremental growth by means of 
girth increment sample plots, which are periodically remeasured across the 
whole range of size classes and for the more valuable tree species, thereby 
giving an accurate indication of the rate of increment and of growth in the 
different size classes. 
Having carried out an assessment of the raw material supplies, we have 
only covered one sector of our pre-investment survey, but we should know at 
this stage whether there is any point in going further, which would only be 
justified where the forest inventory has revealed adequate raw material supplies. 
Markets 
The next sector to examine is markets. The importance of this item cannot 
be too heavily stressed. Without an assured demand for either the raw material 
or the finished product, development cannot be undertaken. A detailed inves 
tigation of all possible markets, both home and export, for raw materials is 
therefore of fundamental value in appraising the possibilities for development. 
In developing countries it will often be the export market which is of greater 
importance, though with rapidly rising populations, literacy standards and 
standards of living, the requirements of the home market may change sub 
stantially over a short period of time and may necessitate a reappraisal of the 
local marketing possibilities. Many developing countries simply exploit their 
forests and export the logs for processing elsewhere. Such log exports in many 
countries, e.g. Ghana, North Borneo, bring in a great proportion of the export 
revenue of the country. While these logs could be transformed in the country 
into sawn wood, veneer, plywood, pulp and paper or board products, the 
assessment of which particular industry to foster, or indeed whether any local 
industry should be fostered, is a matter which depends on the potential markets 
for the raw material. Demand forecasting is a specialized and difficult opera 
tion. It calls for sample surveys and marketing studies in many countries, but 
such an operation is vitally important as part of a pre-investment survey. 
Other than this I do not propose to elaborate on this factor today. 
Capital investiment requirements 
This factor is also irrelevant to this symposium. But I must touch on 
this matter too since without capital forest development cannot proceed, nor 
indeed can the pre-investment survey be carried out. As mentioned in my 
introduction to this talk, a rough figure for resources appraisal, based on con 
siderable recent experience in this field, is that preliminary appraisals should 
amount to about two percent of the estimated capital investment involved in 
implementation. It will, however, be possible to phase this in such a way that 
an initial reconnaissance which will determine whether it is worth going ahead 
to the next phase would cost a limited sum. At this stage a decision can be 
made whether to spend the extra money to determine precise facts and figures. 
Beyond the two percent investment cost a further three percent, making a