NEW ZEALAND LAND VALUES.

Putaruru Press, Volume IV, Issue 145, 12 August 1926, Page 3

NEW ZEALAND LAND VALUES.

AND THOSE OVERSEAS. “ Capitalising- the Climate.” Speaking at the Dominion Conference of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union at Wellington on Tuesday, the president (Mr. W. J. Poison) drew comparisons with the land values in New Zealand and those of other countries. He said there was a belief that land values are much higher in New Zealand than in most other countries and that to quote a much used expression: “ We are capitalising the climate.” “ There is no doubt,” he said, “ that | climatic conditions enable the New j Zealand farmer to work his land cheaper than the American, Canadian, jor Norther European farmer, while absence of the droughts which affect most warmer countries to a greater or lesser degree add to the stability of his business. But while these are factors in the value of land, produc- | five conditions being equal, they are not the only factors. Taxation, especially in Great Britain, is seriously prejudicing land values. “ The comparative absence of cooperative marketing and provisions for storage, etc., have also an influence on prices, while the farming methods which are the inheritance of time and long established custom, are undoubtedly more expensive than ours. “ The result is that a great deal of land in Great Britain is, if anything, lower in value than land of a similar class in New Zealand. On the other hand, however, as far as it was possible to make comparison, New Zealand and Danish and Swedish land was much about the same price, while French farming land was, if anything, higher.

“ The prairie lands of the Western United States, subject ns they are to the handicaps of occasional droughts, long railway haulage, which makes it possible for the Far West, by the use of sea carriage, to undersell the middle West in the markets of the East, and until recently, high interest costs have all helped to keep down American land values elsewhere than -in the fertile lands adjacent to the cities, but there, values are occasionally much higher than anything in New Zealand. On the other hand much of the western and middle western farming land is lower.

“ On the whole, having due regard to the conditions, New Zealand land values to-day, while comparing favourably with those of many countries, are not unreasonably high. The process of deflating has gone on to a more or less extent in most countries as in New Zealand, and the basis of comparison is probably fair. “ At the same time it is the opinion of experts in most countries that we have not yet reached the bottom in regard to values, and that deflation will continue for some considerable time yet.”