HELP FOR MAORIS

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 433, 15 August 1928, Page 12

HELP FOR MAORIS

DAIRY FARMERS IN NORTH NEW CREAM LORRY BOUGHT A new lorry, which has been bought and put into commission by the Native Lands Board to carry cream from Te Kao in the Parengarenga native settlement to the Pakeha dairy factory at Awanui, left Auckland for the Mangonui district this morning. The lorry has been named the “Aupouri,” after the tribe settled at Parengarenga. The purchase of the lorry is part of a scheme by which the board is working to consolidate all the native holdings in the North Cape district. The board is gradually concentrating the Maoris at Parengarenga where the best land lies, and is helping them to settle down as dairy farmers. With this object in view, they have, for the past two years, provided a lorry to carry the cream from the district to the nearest dairy factory at Awanui —a distance of 50 miles. The plan has been so successful, however, that a larger lorry has become necessary, and the “Aupouri” has been bought. The “Aupouri” will collect cream from an area of approximately 5,000 acres, and will carry it three times a week —or possibly every day—to the factory at Awanui. In the past the greater part of the district has been regarded as worthless gum-land, but the board has picked out the best of the land round the township of Te Kao, and is gradually transferring the Maoris from their scattered holdings all over the district to dairy farms in the settlement. In two years the settlement has grown from 3,000 acres to 5,000 acres and, as the work of consolidation continues, it is growing steadily greater. In time it is hoped to build a road north to Te Pake and so tap an area of good land which should be suitable for dairying. In the meantime the board hopes to consolidate completely all the Maori lands in the Mangonui district and to transfer their owners to dairy farms at Parengarenga.