NEW ZEALAND'S POSITION AND RESOURCES. The Agent-General's Views.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 283, 21 July 1888, Page 4

NEW ZEALAND'S POSITION AND RE SOURCES. The Agent-General's Views.

In announcing the Government loan of two millions sterling in May last, tho Agent - General for New Zealand, Sir F. D. Bell, issued a circular setting forth with great perspicacity the position of the finances of the colony, ita railway works and other assets. After particu larising the various items, the docu ment concludes as follows :— It has been the fashion of late to cry down New Zealand as a country that was retrograding fast, and in fact being ruined. Now the "depression" of which so much has been made has lasted ever .since 1882, and according to what the enemies of the colony have said there ought not only to have been no progress, but a great falling - off in capacity to bear the debt. But these statements do not bear the test of official factß. There has been, it is true, an augmentation of the not Public Debt to £35,000,000 ; an increase in banking advances from £13,000,000 to £17,000,000 ; an increase in mortgages from. £30,000,000 to £32,000 000, £15,000,000 of which, however, are colonial capital; a diminution in the net earnings of the railways to les3 than 2-V per cent. ; and a serious fall in the saleable value of landed property, which will reflect ittclf in the next triennial property - tax valuations. But, on the other hand, population and wealth have augmented, as shown by the following figures : — The population has increased trom 545,000 in 1881-82 to 630,000 in ICB6-87 : tho value of real and personal property, fiom £151,000,000 to £179,000,000 ; the value of freehold farms,, from £34,000,000 to £40,000,000 ; the value of houses, from £31,000,000 to £37,000,000 ; tho value of real property from £87,000,000 to £97,000,000 ; the value of pf»-onal property from £64,000,000 to 183,000,000 ; \alue of Government and corporate property i is £20,000,000 ; separate holdings have in- | creased in number from 30,000 to 37,000 ; freehold holdings have increased in number from 19,000 to 24,000 ; payers of property tax have increased in number from I 22,000 to 28,000 ; banking deposits have increased from £9,000,000 to £10,500,000 ; deposits in savings banks have increased from £1,500,000 to £2,000,000 ; cattle have increased in number from 700,000 to 850,000 ; sheep have increa&ed in number from 13,000,000 to 16,500,000 ; acreage in cereals, green crops, and sown grasses has increased from 5,000,000 to 7,000,000 a; theproduceof wool has increased from 60,000,0001b to 90,000,0001b; butter and cheese increased from 12,000,0001b to 17,000,0001b ; frozen meat exported to London, none— in 1886-87, 800,000 ; the output of coal has increased from 278,000 tons to 534,000 tons ; manufactories have increased in number from 1,600 to 2,200 ; The value of land, buildings and machinery in manufactories has increased from £3,600,000 to £6,000,000; the value of manufactured pioducts has risen to £7,500,000; imports have fallen from £7,400,000 to £6,700,000. Exports have increased from £6,000,000 to £6,700,000 ; (thus while in 3881 the imports exceeded the exports by £1,400,000, in 1887 they were practically le^ el. ) The mileage of railways open and under construction has increased from 1,333 miles to 1,910 miles. The least ratio of increase in the li&t here enumerated has been 10 per cent., and in the greater number it ranges from 20 per i cent, upwards.