The demands being placed on the public lands are growing in tandem with the number and diversity of the people the BLM serves. Our ability to meet these new demands will depend on improving the Bureau's accountability to users of the public lands, while emphasizing the responsibility of these users to adhere to an ethic that is sensitive to the land's health and responsive to the public's right to receive fair value in return.

The BLM has historically made land available for authorized private-sector activities, such as recreation, energy and mineral commodity extraction, livestock forage and sawtimber production, and other related land use authorizations and land dispositions, and we will continue to do so. Taxpayers should expect to receive a fair return from such transactions, consistent with existing laws. The BLM will also ensure that environmental impacts on the land and on other users are minimized so as to prevent long- term impairment or the creation of unfunded taxpayer liabilities.

BLM administers an onshore surface and mineral estate of about 264 million acres of public land, plus another 300 million acres of mineral estate underlying other lands. BLM also provides technical supervision of mineral development on Indian lands.

The following tables of statistics show the essential outputs of various interrelated programs that provide commercial uses as shown in Tables 3-1 through 20. Tables 3-21 through 28 display outcome-oriented information in terms of receipts or payments and the allocation of funds generated from commercial use activities on public lands. It must be noted that only receipts and payments collected by BLM are listed. For revenues derived from BLM energy and mineral activities, please refer to Mineral Revenues in the annual report of the Minerals Management Service, a Department of the Interior agency. The total onshore mineral revenues, including royalties, rents, and bonus bids, were $993.7 million for fiscal year 1996.

Page #PART3 February 21, 1997