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1 Key Findings

· The South produces approximately 60 percent of the nation's timber products, almost all of it from private forests; the South produces more timber than any other single country in the world, and it is projected to remain the dominant producing region for many decades to come.

· Timberland area is projected to increase in many parts of the South, especially in western and northern portions, due to agricultural land conversion to forest and to tree planting. Timberland will be lost, especially to urban and residential land uses and especially in the Piedmont region (Virginia to Georgia) and in Florida. The net effect of losses and gains is no significant change in timberland area under two plausible scenarios. However, in aggregate in the South, nonplantation forest acreage is projected to decline by an average of 15 percent under all market and plantation growth scenarios considered.

· Production of both hardwood and softwood timber is projected to increase southwide, but the largest percentage increases are projected for northern and western portions of the region, especially in Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia.

· Timber prices are projected to increase in the United States and the South over the next 40 years under two plausible scenarios. The price rises serve as continued incentives for private forestland owners to keep land in forests in some places, to improve timber growing and wood processing productivity, and to heavily invest in timber growing technology and intensive forest management.

· Private landowners in the South are projected to continuously expand areas of pine plantations in the region far into the future. An outcome of this is a projected increase in the area of pine plantations--in the base scenario, by 67 percent (from 33 to 54 million acres) between 1995 and 2040.