UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS: (18.10.1949). A set of six stamps was issued to encourage Forestry and Field Conservancy in the Soviet Union. The outstanding stamp is the 40 kopek value which carries a map of the southwestern area, showing the shelterbelt system established to assist agricultural production by improving the local climate. Illustrated in the other stamps selected are: special tree planting machines used in the establishment of shelterbelts, and the importance of arousing in youth an awareness of the value of tree-cover. The role of forests in relation to agriculture is stressed, in the right hand border of each stamp, which is decorated with different motifs of forest leaves and ears of wheat.
TAIWAN: (12.3.1954). Recreation and shelter are the themes of one of a pair of stamps issued in connection with National Tree Day.
TAIWAN: (1.4.1955). One of a pair of stamps issued as a second set released by the Formosa Government to encourage national interest in afforestation. The theme illustrated emphasizes the role of forest cover in water conservation.
KOREA: (14.12.1954). Issued in connection with arousing an awareness to the value of forest cover, the design is of a seedbearer and a seedling with, in the middle background, a representation of forested hills depicted as green and white pyramids. The sale of this series coincided with the holding of the Fourth World Forestry Congress at Dehra Dun, in India.
KOREA: (6.3.1953). Issued in connection with their annual Tree Loving Week, which was first inaugurated in 1949. The first day of the week is called Arbor Day and perpetuates an occasion which was first established in 1911 together with new forestry regulations encouraging reforestation and the formation of forestry associations. This issue aims at arousing public opinion to the urgent need for reestablishing tree-cover destroyed during recent hostilities.
IRAN: (11.12.1954). One of a series of four stamps issued to commemorate the Fourth World Forestry Congress, held at Dehra India. The designs depict various forms of forest products utilization and types of equipment.
CANADA: (1.4.1952). Although not issued in connection with any specific forestry occasion, this stamp has as objective the arousing of an awareness, in Canadian public opinion, of the importance of forests and forest produce to the country's economic and social life. The design, a broad strip of wood shaped as a coniferous tree on the left, becomes a bleached curl of paper on the right. In the foreground is a pulp mill symbolizing the wealth of Canada's timber resources.
ISRAEL: (22.9.1953). Issued to commemorate the Conquest of the Desert Exhibition. The prophet Isaiah (35:1) said "The desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose" and this symbolic rose forms part of the exhibition emblem.
During 1917-18 Lord Allenby, while his army was engaged on its conquering sweep across the Holy Land, inaugurated tree planting in the Plain of Esdraelon. The work was done by Arab villagers under the direction of British non-commissioned officers. From the end of the first world war to the foundation of Israel, the Jewish National Fund had 72 afforestation centers, covering 23,400 dunams, and it also restored some 40,000 dunams of neglected forest. Today there are some 21 million trees in the Jewish National Fund forests in Israel.
SWITZERLAND: (15.3.1954). One stamp of a publicity issue advertising the 11th National Agricultural, Horticultural and Forestry Exhibition held at Lucerne.
JAPAN: (1.4.1948). The Japanese have always been very tree-conscious, and a national tree festival is celebrated annually throughout the first week of April, known as Greening Week. This was first inaugurated in 1948, when this stamp was issued.
JAPAN: (1.4.1949). Issued at the beginning of the second annual celebration of Greening Week for the encouragement of afforestation. Since its inauguration, some 10,000 hectares have been reforested every year by high-school pupils as well as by children from elementary schools. In order to encourage this campaign, the Ministers of Agriculture and Forestry and of Education award prizes to the best schools in the school forest contest.
RYUKYU ISLANDS: (18.2.1956). Issued to commemorate Afforestation Week, the design indicates the place of tree-cover in mountainous country
RYUKYU ISLANDS: (19.2.1951). The first stamp issued to commemorate Afforestation Week in the Islands.
FINLAND: (15.6.1949). On the occasion of the opening of the Third World Forestry Congress in Helsinki, two stamps were issued, one depicting the pulp and paper industry, and the other the Congress emblem, consisting of the world and a conifer.
NORWAY: (15.6.1948). Issued to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Norwegian Forestry Society, and in favor of its founder, Axel Heilberg, born in 1848. This is believed to be the only postage stamp so far issued which portrays a forester. Sweden honored one of her sons, the naturalist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) or Carl von Linne (the name being derived from the Swedish word for the linden-tree), on a stamp issued on 2 June 1939 to commemorate the 200th Anniversary, of the Swedish Academy of Science; but he was thus honored as the father of modern botany, not as a forester.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: (22.4.1932). Issued to commemorate the 60th Anniversary of the establishment of Arbor Day, first instituted by J. S. Morton in Nebraska on 10 April 1872. The observance of an Arbor Day has since become established in one form or another in all of the States. The date of observance varies greatly however, because of the wide range in climate and the consequent differences in optimum planting time. Tree planting on Arbor Day is done largely by school children and combines pleasure with utility and instruction.
VENEZUELA: (26.8.1950). One of a very colorful set of nine stamps all portraying Venezuela's national tree, Tabebuia chrysantha (syn: Bignonia chrysantha, named after Abbé Bignon, 1626-1743, who was librarian to Louis XIV). A Resolution of 29 May 1948 jointly drawn up by the Ministries of Education and Agriculture, declared that Tabebuia chrysantha be the officially recognized national tree of Venezuela and was to figure as such in all studies on the country's flora. The tree, whose local name is Araguaney, in honour of J.E.V. Arago, 1790-1855, who accompanied De Freycinet on his 1817-1820 expedition, is 12 to 15 feet in height and bears a profusion of brilliant yellow flowers in May, when Venezuela celebrates its annual tree festival.
COLOMBIA: (October 1949). Issued to commemorate the First (National) Forestry Congress at Bogotá, held in October 1945.
PHILIPPINES: (19.8.1952). The stamp portrays Señora Aurora Quezon who was murdered by guerillas while she was on her way to attend a memorial ceremony at the birthplace of her late husband, Manuel Luis Quezon (1878-1944), first president of the Philippines from 1935 to 1944. A memorial in the form of annual awards to Filipino school children for the best tended fruit trees has now been established.
PHILIPPINES: (14.4.1950). Depicting the Red Lauan tree, the stamp was issued to commemorate the 15th Anniversary of the Forest Service. It must also have greatly encouraged the Philippine forest officers engaged in helping to heal the scars of war. Of the Red Lauan tree, Father Gaspar de San Agustin writes, in Conquests of the Philippine Islands, that the outside planks of the old Manila and Acapulco galleons were of lauan wood, which was chosen because it does not splinter with shot.
ITALY: (21.11.1951). Issued on the occasion of the first Festival of Trees to be celebrated under the legally sanctioned responsibility of the Ministry of Agriculture. The festival in Italy dates back to 21 November 1899 when it was first celebrated on the initiative of the Minister of Public Instruction. Its annual execution is now the responsibility of the State Forestry Corps, acting in co-operation with the Ministries of Education and Labor.
INDIA: (11.12.1954). The Fourth World Forestry Congress was held at the Forest Research Institute and Colleges, at Dehra Dun, India. The stamp illustrates the site of the Congress and was issued in connection with the meeting. The growth of the Institute has kept pace with the development of forest policy and timber utilization in India. Dehra Dun has been a center of forest education and research since 1878, when a Forestry School was established for the training of forest rangers. In 1906, a research department was added to the school and it was redesignated as the Imperial Forest Research Institute and College. In 1938, the Indian Forest College was established as an integral part of the Institute which, in 1951, was recognized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as a center for technical training in forestry for the Southeast Asian Region.
BRAZIL: (30.9.1956). One of the most recent stamps issued in connection with forestry, it marks the opening of the Forestry Education Campaign in Brazil.
ROMANIA: (1.4.1954). One of a second set of stamps issued to remind Romanians, during the Month of the Forest, how much they owe to their forests and how essential it is to care for them. Half of the country is mountainous, the remainder consisting of the rich alluvial Danube basin, which is now largely deforested. The hill country was, until the 18th century, well wooded; but it then became sorely depleted to meet the needs of the Turkish markets. The wars of this century have made further inroads and some estimates now place the proportion of forest-covered land to total area as low as 10 percent.
ROMANIA: (April 1955). Wildlife (as illustrated), planting and rafting were the themes selected for the third annual series commemorating the Month of the Forest.
ROMANIA: (20.8.1953). One of three stamps of the first of an annual series issued in connection with the Month of the Forest. Whereas this one bears the slogan: "Forests near our fields, corn in our granaries", the others illustrate the texts. "Re-establish the forests of our country" and: "The forests act as barriers against the fury of rivers and torrents."
ROMANIA: (April 1956). One of two stamps issued in connection with the annual celebration of the month of the Forest depicting felling, extraction and replanting.
NOTE: For this information we are in large part indebted to Mr. A. C. Garrad, of the United Kingdom.
