Program Enrollment and Acreage Response to Reforestation Cost-Sharing Programs

Five alternative sets of predictions are presented of the total acreage of southern pine that would have been planted after clear-cut harvest if existing government Forest Improvement Programs had made different levels of cost-sharing available to nonindustrial private forest owners. The predictions illustrate the importance of separating and accounting for both the number of tracts enrolled and for the size of enrolled tracts. Predictions are obtained from a profit maximization model that represents the owner's decision as a simultaneous choice of reforestation practice and size of tract to harvest and reforest.