Closed forest areas in Palestine before 1948 (Nakba), British Mandate: A Survey of Palestine: Volume I - Page 427. Chapter XI: Irrigation and Drainage

CHAPTER XI.

aries. By 1939 the total area of demarcated forest reserves was 370,000 dunums, but further large areas still remained to be gazetted with definite boundaries. From 1936 until 19.39 operations had been practically suspended owing to the disturbances, but, since April, 1939, fifty-four reserves having a total area of 136,000 dunums have been proclaimed with definite boundaries, and operations are continuing as quickly as is possible with one demarcation party. Some losses have occurred by cancellation and adjustment of boundaries, thus reducing the total area of demarcated forest reserves to 565,346 dunums on 31st March, 1945.

12. Even in the demarcated reserves the absence of trained protective staff and the persistence of lawless conditions in rural districts permitted the gradual destruction of the vegetation in all but the most remote areas, but, except during the lengthy disturbances of 1936-39, comparatively little land was lost to the State by illegal encroachment and cultivation.

13. It should be borne in mind that the demarcation and gazetting of forest reserves was intended to safeguard State forest land and the vegetation thereon until Land Settlement could provide for the registration of all rural State Domains, after which it was believed that the State could manage and develop the forests found on its own property. The system of reservation has more than fulfilled all expectations; in many localities settlement officers have recorded as State Domain the whole of a forest reserve and nothing else. Near Tiberias, Nazareth and Haifa, there are many newly registered State Domains with precisely the same boundaries as the old forest reserves, while all the land outside those boundaries has been occupied and claimed by private owners in whose names it is now registered. From the point of view of ownership, then, the practice of reservation has proved its value.

Closed forest areas *.

14. There is perhaps room for confusion between the proclamation of a forest reserve and the declaration of a closed forest area. The first process has been described above. From time to time a certain forest reserve or part thereof is declared a closed forest area. The land is thereupon closed to entry and no licences for grazing and cutting therein are issued. The Department does not lightly adopt such a course, since the effective protection of a closed forest needs considerable staff. The present practice is to employ one woodman for each 500 dunums of closed forest, to protect and work the land which is also the object of frequent inspection by
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* Section 13 of the Forests Ordinance.

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