THE BIRTH RATE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2369, 9 December 1908, Page 2

THE BIRTH RATE.

NEW ZEALAND’S POPULATION

INTERESTING- COMPARISONS

New Zealand and Australia- are two young nations yet in the making, and

both to-day are face to face with tlio

.Mime problem—how best to populate their uninhabited tracts of land with a people ,of their own. And the birth-rates of both countries .have a hutch more important, though not so immediately perceptible, effect on this question than tho immigration policies of. the Governments, of tlie day. From this point of view the position in Nerv Zealand at the present time is interesting. According to tho annual report of the Public Health Department, the number of births registered in the Dominion, during 1907 was 25,094. This is a higher mte per thousand than any of the Australian States, with the" exception of West Australia, but when the figures are compared for a period of years there is not much cause for congratulation. In 1.880 New Zealand) with fur less young people of marriageable age than it has to-day, had the highest birth-rate of Australasia (40.78; in 1900 it had tho lowest. Since then there has been a gradual improvement, with last year (27.30) the best, of the period, but when the figures aro investigated from the point of view of proportional, and not numerical, increase, .it is found that tao birth-ipte is steadily declining. In 1878 the birth-rate was 337 for each 1000 married women. In .1896 : t had fallen to 252, in 1901 to 244, and in 1906 to 228. In 1878 the number of married women in New Zealand between 15 and 45 years of age wars 98,211. It is found that the number of children to each marriage is cleclining. For the 10 years 1888-1897 the average was 4.51 children to a marriage, but during the next 10 years there was' a fall to an average of 3.33. New Zealand is not alone in this respect, for in the Australian States a similar decrease is noticeable.

A curious fact, which may hare mi important bearing on this problem, is that New Zealanders of the present duy are not marrying at so young an age as they diet—2-3 years ago. In ISSI there were 1203 wives between the ages of 15 and 20, but ,-in 1906 there were only 928 between these ages. On the other hand, tho number of married women between the ages of 20 and 2o in that period shows an increase from 8996 in 1881 to 12,153 in 1906. But this is merely u numerical! increase, for the proportion per cent, of the population shows a falling off from 15.66 to 12.37. As stated, the New Zealand birth-rate is slightly gaining ground now, when compared with the period from 1882 to 1899, when there was a regular annual fall. It is interesting to note the varying birth-rates in the four principal centres of the Dominion. The total for .1907 was 701 S, as against 6512 for the previous year. Christchurch beads the list, with . 30.47 per thousand of population, and Auckland comes next, with 29.63; but when tho six suburban boroughs are included the latter rate drops to 27.46. Wellington’s average is 27.53, and Dunedin’s 25.69. It lias been shown that the birth-rate for the whole Dominion was last year 27.30. The figures for the four principal centres show that Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch are thus over the average, and Dunedin below, it. But the birth-rates in Auckland, Wellington, and Dunedin show a fall when, compared with 1906, and Auckland city’s birth-rate has been steadily failing from 1903, when it stood ufc 31.67. Dunedin rose from 19.54 in 1903 to 28.96 in 1906, but dropped to 25.69 last year. The fall in the capital’s birth-rate is comparable with that of Auckland, as it has decreased in the five vears named from 29.22 to 27.53

Another point worthy of notice is that in 1891 there was" an excess of bachelors over spinsters in New Zealand amounting to 3497,' but the positions were gradually reversed, until in 1901 there was an excess of 3572 women. The census of 1906, however, disclosed the fact that there is again a considerable excess of'bachelors in New Zealand, amounting to 9633. The result is attributed to some extent to the arrival from abroad of numbers of young male immigrants.