PRICE OF DAIRY LAND.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1442, 17 May 1912, Page 10

PRICE OF DAIRY LAND.

A WARNING,

A paragraph relating to the price of dairy land, which occurs, in the notes of tho Taranaki':'cc*ftesp'ohden't l ''<Jfr;ithe' "Weeklv Press" and states that a farm has been leased at .£3 ss. per acre and quotes the opinion, of a settler to the effect that dairy land in the future may be worth Xl5O per acre, prompts the following comment in tho journal in question:— "The extravagant ideas now held about the value of dairy land should rather excite pitv than ridicule. We would like some*of those dairy farmers who purchase MO per acre land to show a balance-sheet after a year's working. The sheet should show a fair allowance for wages, and not that a profit had been made by depending upon a faniily of children'. But even if'it. is possible to show a profit upon i(>o per acre dairy land in . Taranaki—the possibility • of which we neither deny nor affirm—how can it be done on ,£l5O or even .ClflO per acre land? If it could be done at ill it might be by retailing milk at the highest town rates, but not by supplying a dairy factory, even with butter-fat at Is. per" lb., under the present conditions. The requisite number of cows giving a sufficient return are not available, and dairy, farmers arc not yet advanced in the method of growing the greatest amount of feed to enable the industry' to •be profitable upon land at such ridiculously high prices. One bad season, evan with land- at present or lower prices, was almost sufficient to spell disaster only a few short years ago, aiid what Taranaki dairy farmers would have done had another adverse season followed, they probably know best '• themselves. Perhaps one of . the best checks upon the foolish speculation in land that has been going on all over the country will be the fact that money is'now more scarce and dear; at anyrate, mortgages will not be so easy to effect as they havo been. Cheap money is -:i good thing for the country when it. leads to development, hut when it has been so freely used as of late years for pure speculation in land, it is, tjmc a halt was called. It is a remarkable fact that while there has been so much money invested in land, our exports of produce have fallen off. by ,£2,000,000 this last year., and by about the same amount the year.before. ...At the same time the value of our imports this last year exceeded our exports. It may be argued that this is a matter of seasons and prices. Even if that were the whole answer—which it is not—does not that, still indicate that more attention, should be paid to better farming-and cheaper production rather than wasting capital by giving, inflated prices for land? Our falling exports and rising imports indicate, that there ..is something radically wrong. Our exports are -almost-entirely .made up from products of the soil, "and unless the spirit •of speculation gives way to. greater efforts lo increase our exports, the land will bo more likely, to go .back rather than increase in value, and then the unfortunates who gave high prices will be badly hit—if not niined."

Chick-rearing Ig not only profitable, but ft pleasure, when you feed "A and P" Chick-Raiser. It is complete and pro-perly-blended food for Young Chicks. Obtainable from all storekeepers.—Advt.