Proclamation 4088—National Forest Products Week, 1971

Today, we are acutely aware of the scarcity of our Nation's vital resources. Some have been lost irretrievably, but others, including products from forests, lend themselves to long-term management.

As our country has grown, it has become increasingly dependent on our forest resources for shelter, furnishings, paper and many other products essential to our way of life. But only now are we beginning to truly appreciate the importance of forests for maintaining a balanced ecology. We must make effective use and management of our forests with due regard for the environment so that we will strengthen our rural economy as well as provide aesthetic and recreational benefits for our people.

The Congress, in order to emphasize the importance of forest resources and forest products to the Nation, has by a joint resolution of September 13, 1960 (74 Stat. 898) designated the seven-day period beginning on the third Sunday of October in each year as National Forest Products Week, and has requested the President to issue an annual proclamation calling for the observance of that week.

Now, Therefore, I, Richard Nixon, President of the United States of America, do hereby call upon the people of the United States to observe the week beginning October 17, 1971, as National Forest Products Week, with activities and ceremonies designed to focus our attention on the forest resources with which we have been so abundantly blessed and the ways which these resources can contribute to our material, emotional, and spiritual advantage.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this 13th day of October, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred seventy-one, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred ninety-sixth.

RICHARD NIXON