Suggested

Plans For Solomon

Islands

New Timber Industry Suggested

PLANS for the rehabilitation and economic development of the battle scarred Solomon Islands are now being worked out, and the first free grant under the Colonial Development and Welfare Act for one of a series of basic investigations has been approved. The Act provides for an expenditure of £120,000,000 in the British Colonies in the next ten years.

These investigations will cover soil, mineral and forest resources, and the data will be used to plan the economic future of the Protectorate, a large part of which was for more than a year under Japanese occupation, and subsequently a battlefield during its liberation.

The first application for financial help concerns the investigation of forest re sources, and a free grant of £5,200 will meet the cost of a forest officer, a botanist and a commercial expert for periods up to two years.

The dense forests of the Solomon Islands are possibly the Protectorate’s greatest potential sources of wealth. It is hoped the investigations will secure their exploitation on a sound economic basis.— “Colonial Office Press Section,” December 5, 1944.