Attractive Settlement

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 792, 12 October 1929, Page 10

Attractive Settlement

Canada’s Successful Experiment

WHILE New Zealanders are striving to solve the problem of land development and settlement, a few reflections upon the Peace River Settlement Scheme in British Columbia give an idea of what the Canadian authorities have done for the effective opening up of out-back lands. In the Peace River district there is room for 1,000,000 settlers upon farms occupying 47,000,000 acres.

The reputation of the Peace River is world-wide as one of the most successful backbloek developmental plans that has ever been undertaken. The producing capacity of the land was known to be excellent, but the difficulty of access was for years a great stumbling block in the way of close farming. This has been largely overcome by the adoption of a comprehensive plan, and settlement Is booming in the richest wheat-growing belt in our sister Dominion.

It will be claimed immediately by those who are facing the New Zealand land problem that there is no analogy between the sweet pastures of the Peace River and the third-class pumice land of the South Auckland districts, or the pakihi lands of the West Coast of the South Island. That is correct, but a close study of the administration in the Peace River will furnish many sound ideas for the New Zealand rural development enthusiast, and will give an indication of what can be done upon land which, at the time of settlement, was neither cleared nor cultivated. TOWNSHIPS PLANNED

The secret of success there appears to be first, the attractiveness of the terms of settlement, and secondly the rigidity of the provisions under which the land is taken. Every person who is over the age of 18 years and who is a British subject, or who declares his intention to become a British subject, is entitled to apply for entry for a homestead. The land is already made out into townships of 36 sections, each of 640 acres, and is then divided into quartersections, each of 160 acres. These are the blocks which the individual farmers take up. A quarter-section may be secured as a homestead on the payment of an entry fee of 10 dollars, and the fulfilment of certain conditions of residence and cultivation.

When a potential settler applies for his 160 acres, he does not immediately become the possessor of the freehold. First of all he must build a habitable house and undertake the cultivation. Within three years he must qualify for the freehold by having 30 acres broken in—lo acres a year—and at least 20 acres of It must be cropped. There is no rigid stipulation of 10 acres annually for the three years, so long as the holder clears “a reasonable area” each year

and lias his 30 acres broken by the end of the third term.

When the land presents exceptional difficulties, allowance is made by the authorities for an extension of time or a reduction in the area to be cleared. Under certain conditions additional land is allowed the settler, the area to be cultivated correspondingly increased. The vast numbers of settlers who have gone on to the land in the Peace River district, and the comparatively small percentage of cancellation, provide an illustration of the success of the scheme. The fact that the district is the richest wheat-producing country in the world adds to the attractiveness of the initial proposition. A MILLION SETTLERS In the Peace River area there are 47,000,000 acres, sufficient, an authority claims, to accommodate 1,000,000 settlers. This means enormous production, for Ontario, with an agricultural production valued at round about £1,000,000, is using 25,000,000 acres far all purposes, while in the three Prairie Provinces (Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta) last year, over 500.000,000 bushels of wheat were produced from 22,500,000 acres. Au idea is readily acquired, then, of what the development of 47,000,000 acres of rich wheat-growing land means to the Dominion of Canada. People of all nations and of all sects are going to the Peace River. Recently 300 French-Canadians took up between them 12,000 acres of virgin land, while individual settlers are steadily making their way through to the new settlements. It is the administrative rather than the productive side which is of interest to New Zealand. Conditions have been made sufficiently attractive to bring thousands of people from, all over the world, and special contracts valued at £7,000,000 have been entered into between the Federal authorities and the railway concerns to convey home-makers to one district alone. Canada has spent the money to inaugurate a land settlement scheme, and now she is reaping the fruits of this expenditure. Capital is required, it is true, but the magnitude of the scheme is the chief element in its success, as the big outlay will ultimately be returned one hundredfold. —L.J.C.