Taiwan, from a bird's-eye view, is in large part covered with green, thriving trees. Forests totaling about 1,965,000 hectares (4,912,500 acres) cover 55 percent of the Taiwan area. Because of the island's semi-tropical, humid conditions, and high mountains, there are almost countless kinds of trees. More than 600 have high economic value. They can be grouped into following categories according to altitude and climate: the sub-tropical, such as banyan and acacia; the warm area, such as machilus and camphor tree; the temperate, such as Chinese cypress and Japan cypress; and the frigid, such as Morrison spruce and Kawakami fir. Timber reserves total about 220,000,000 cubic meters. Timber industries, including logging, sawing and processing, have developed rapidly. The logging industry uses laborers and heavy machines to harvest forest tracts. There are more than 400 logging operations in Taiwan with the annual capacity of 2,000,000 cubic meters. The timber sawing industry cuts logs into useful wood materials. The annual production is over 1,000,000 cubic meters. If construction, decoration and transportation materials are included, the capacity is around 2,000,000 cubic meters. The timber processing industry includes such items as manufacture of wooden furniture, preservation of timber, shipbuilding, packing, production of matches, handicrafts, plywood, paper pulp and fiber.
Sawing machine cuts log into usable pieces
Smaller machine at work in a Taiwan mill
A slicer in lumber production
Grading of products is an important operation
Timber sawed on the table in manufacturing lumber
Daub of crack-proof lacquer protects wood products
Woman worker in a Taiwan lumber plant
Products packed for shipping to market
