Hardwood Forests:
A valuable resource supporting a viable industry
As Pennsylvanians, we share a common past – including a valuable resource that is just as important today as it was 300 years ago: Our forests.
You may live on a farm, in the suburbs or a city neighborhood – wherever you live in Pennsylvania, a healthy hardwood forest is not far away. In fact, these forests cover more than half our state. They’re what the original settlers saw when they sailed up the Delaware. When William Penn named it Pennsylvania – literally “Penn’s Woods.” Our forests are our heritage: What we’ve received from the past, and are working – through the science of modern sustainable forestry – to pass on to the future.
Pennsylvania’s forests – and the lumber and wood products they produce – are world–class. Pennsylvania leads the nation in growing hardwood trees. We’re No. 1. We produce one billion board feet of lumber every year. Yet there are still 89 billion board feet in the forests. Despite what many think, the volume of Pennsylvania’s hardwood trees is growing twice as fast as it’s being cut.
Forest Coverage in Pennsylvania
The dark green areas on the map are forests. Pennsylvania is truly a “green” state, in all the best senses of the word.
Pennsylvania forests provide some of the finest hardwoods in the world. There are over 30 commercially recognized species. Oak, cherry and maple are the most popular. Their natural high quality wood makes beautiful furniture, moldings, kitchen cabinets, paneling, flooring, musical instruments, sports equipment and more. Pennsylvania hardwoods add beauty and value wherever they are used.
Besides its beauty and versatility, there‘s another good reason to buy and use Pennsylvania hardwoods: Our jobs. You probably know someone in the lumber and wood products industry. It’s a multi-billion business and provides nearly 40,000 jobs all across the state. Good jobs that pay, on average, $44,000 a year. Jobs in the forest products industry range from foresters to manufacturing, sales, shipping and many types of administrative and support positions.
When you buy a product manufactured here from Pennsylvania hardwoods, it supports those jobs. And those jobs support our economy. It’s called a multiplier effect. Every dollar of sales creates $1.37 of business in other parts of our local economy. We need to bring furniture and wood product manufacturing home to Pennsylvania.