ABSTRACT
Given the biological and silvicultural characteristics of the nonindustrial private forests of the United States, given the difficult problems of managing and operating such forests, and given the market for the kinds of timber such forests currently produce, as these have been described in earlier chapters, what, realistically, is the economic supply potential from these forests for the middle term future—up to, say, 2000? What will they likely produce, how will this production fit into the national timber supply, and what might they produce under the stimulus of higher wood prices? These are the questions to which this chapter is directed. Finn answers are not possible, in part because the problem is complex, in part because we do not fully understand the economics of such forests, and in part because the future is always unclear. However, some indications are possible, and the best effort at a realistic projection may be highly useful.
