Thomas Ford Chipp

Thomas Ford Chipp
Chipp around 1930, a year before his death
Born	1 January 1886 Gloucester, England
Died	28 June 1931 (1931-06-29) (aged 45) London, England
Nationality	British
Occupation	Botanist

Thomas Ford Chipp (1 January 1886 – 28 June 1931) was an English botanist who became Assistant Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He played an important role in development of the study of ecology in the British Empire.

Chipp was born in 1886, son of a constable in Gloucester who died when Thomas was five years old. Chipp was accepted by the Royal Masonic School, and then became a student gardener at Kew. He was admitted to University College, London, earning a degree in botany in 1909. He then obtained a job as conservator of forests in the Gold Coast colony. His reports from this period show enthusiasm for developing the colonial economy combined with interest in the local environment and people. Detailed reports on local estates covered topography, climate, ecology, commercial value and suggestions for improvements. The reports were written for the use of local landowners and were not published in scientific journals.

A highly organized man, with great attention to detail, Chipp made extensive use of forms and questionnaires to gather and collate information from many sources on subjects that ranged from tree growth rates to illegal woodcutting. He later applied this technique to his ecological research. During World War I (1914–1919) Chipp was an officer in the British Expeditionary Force in France, rising to the rank of major. After the war he returned to the Gold Coast and resumed his work on forest management. He published a dissertation on the ecology of the Gold Coast forests that gained him a doctoral degree from the University of London and was published as a book.

From Chipp's viewpoint, the natives were often an obstacle to efficient forest management. Describing the difficulty of establishing forest reserves in the Gold Coast, he said "every attempt to organise forestry on the same lines as obtain in other parts of the Empire where there are valuable and important forests, has been frustrated by the strong opposition of the natives, who understanding hardly, if at all, the peril of their country arising from the destruction of their forests, cannot bring themselves to surrender their individual rights for the protection of the forests". He was frustrated by the destructive habit of burning forest to clear it for agricultural use and deeply concerned by the ecological impact of the growing population.