The Daily News. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1901. THE LANDS REPORT.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXIII, Issue 201, 10 September 1901, Page 2

The Daily News. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1901. THE LANDS REPORT.

The annual report of the Minister for Lands was laid on the table of thf House last week. The transactions for the past year hava been fully equal to those of 1899-1900, the actual lands dealt with being 1,667,744 acres, as against 1,573,823 acres in the previous year,and the cash collected is £431,338, as against £382,943 for the year 18991900. The new selections are 2312 for the past year, and 2310 for the year before. The largest transactions in actual settlement have been in the Auckland district, where 473 settlers tc«k up on leasehold tenure 182,236 acres, chiefly from the forest lands between Te JLuiti and Kawhia, Wellington comes next with 149 leasehold settlers on 40,143 acres, Taranaki with 145 settlers on 66,121 acres, Otagowith 109 settlers on 25,327 acres. The other districts follow at considerable distances, and make up the total of 1162 leasehold settlers on 406,932 acres. During the year sales of rural lands for cash were made to 165 selec- j tors of 58,245 acres. During the year 195 holders of the old perpetual leases converted their leaseholds of 67,941 acres into freehold, and 177 holders of deFerred payment licenses made their final payments on 23,824 acres, and also became freeholders. Four settlers under the homestead system were also grantfd freehold titles, the area being 303 acres. During last year the expenditure on roads was £312,091, and of this large sum about £177,000 was expended in making and improving new roads and tracks, and quite as much will be required every year for many years to come. The lands to he put in the market next year, leaving for tho present out of consideration lands purchased, are about 430,000 acrea of pastoral country, and 120,000 acres of land a good deal of which is Jit for dairy farms and for cultivation. The pastoral Jand is in Auckland, Marlborough, and O;ago, and the land for dairy farms and cultivation is in Taranaki, Nelson, Marlborough, andWestland. There were 310 persons who forfeited because they would not, or could not, pay their rent, ■and 99 leases were surrendered chiefly because the rents were considered by the lessees to be too bigb. Of the lands wich reverted to the Crown in this way, 124 sections were re-offered 1 to the public, and 88 were selected by I other tenants. Village settlements, it is disappointing to find, havo not been so beneficial to the people for whom they wero devised aa was ex-i pected. So long as road wo ks and. first operations in the way of settle- • meut employed the villagers they were 1 prosperous ; now the settlements are j declining or they are pressing for more | J land. Thero were 1880 selectors on 1 these village settlements in 1895, hold-, jug 39,496 acres, and this year, including those who have exchanged to ordinary leaso in perpetuity, there are 2011, holding 42,414 acres. The 12,599,413 ccrrs occupied purely for pasture, returned this year a rent of £96,637, or 35 per cent, of the territorial Grown revenue. Its importance

Sj fcoerefore, evident, and its conserva- | fcion merits careful administration. The dissounos granted u/ider the Crown Tenants Rebate Act of last session on one half-year's rent, amounts to £2517, the largest being in the land district i.f Canterbury. In the districts of Auckland, Hawke's Bay, Taranaki, and Westland, no rebate wag given during the lasb financial year. During tho piesent yer, 10 estates, containing 43,942 ac es w«ra de-ilt with under t! e Lands for Settlement Act. The no t ; of the land purchase! 168,193. B - tides these five estates were purchased, but not in time to put them in the market before the end of the y»ar. The area of these estates is 41,015 acres, and the cost to data £157,666. Of the ten estates opened for selection, 41,546 acres, in 127 farms and two small grazing runs, the areas varying from 50 to 2000 acres, were leased at a re*vt of £8174 per annum, equal to 5 P'jr cent, of the purchase money, survey, administration, and road formation. For country lands the demand is very good. The arrears of rents due by 280 tenants under the Land for Settlements Act, is £8271, and is £IO7B greater than at the same time in the previous year. The prime cost of 81 estates, containing 331,128 acres, repurchased, is £1,710,541, and there was £88,073 expended in incidental expanses and expenses incurred in incompleted negotiations, in road making, and in preparing the land for occupation in the sma'lcr aross into which the properties were dividtd, making a cost to date cf £1,798,614. The lands disposed of are let to 1789 tenants, at an annual rental of £82,718, and the lands unlet represent an annual rental of £l9lO. The yearly value is therefore £84,628. As a whole, the rent actually received during the year is equal to 4 per cent, on the total cost at the end of the year. This yearly reut is, however* really derived from an expenditures of £1,656,431, the sum of £142,183, which was paid for Hatumu just at the close of the year, yielding no rent for that period. This being a large sum,materially affects the npparect earning rate, and if it is deducted fro in the total cost of the estates the rent paid is equal to interest at the rate of . 5 per cent., and the letting value of ' the land offered for selection is 51 per cent. It must, however, be considered that there has yet to be expended on reads on thaso estates 'about £8361. Territorial revenue amounts .toe £7974 in. excels of last year, apd tho total money collected by the Department is £48,395 more also. The area of bush felled in preparing the land for gra»s or cultivation during th* past year was 12,981 acres. Since 1895 the forest lands of the colony have been cleared to' the extent of 1,064,718 acres. In the North Island the clearings amount to 930,923 acrep, and in the Middle Island to 133,795 a errs. Thenustries at Wbakirairarewa, Eweburn, and Tapanui have grown 5,531,665 young forest trees, shiubs, and orramental trees. Thera serves at Whakarewarewa, Na>eby, Waiotapu, and Dusky Hill have teen planted with 434,416 forest tree?, and 30,759 ornamental trees and shrubs have been supplied to domains and local bodies. At Waiotapu a beginning has been made in the plantation of 1280 acres by prison labour, and so far the men sent to this work have done good service. Nexc year it is hoped still better progress will be made, as the nureeries are new capable of supplying about a million and ahalf trees, and within three years two) million plants per annum. The forest? of New Zealand are being rapidly converted, but there is still a large area both North and South which will be sufficient for home consumption and 1 export for a good many years yet. The most accessible, and the best timber, will, no doubt, be used up in say 20 ytais, but other kinds now less esteemed will come into use when these are done. The kauri timber growing in the North is estimated at 1,250,000,000 superficial feet, and as the conversion is about 70,000,000 ft per ttnnum, the supply will be exhausted in about 18 year p. The kahikatea and rimu forests in the three islands are extensive enough to sustain a much greater rate of conversion for future generations. In Westland alone it is estimated there nrtforeats which will produce 15,000,000 ft per annum for 500 years. On account of roads the year 1899-1900 closed with a liability for works authorised to i be done of £303,149, of which there was at the disposal cf local authorities £102,124, and there was entrusted to the staff of the Department £201,025. For the year 1900-1901 the House voted for expenditure £433,997, which included" the abovenamed liability of the previous year. There was actually expended during the year under review a net sum of £310,660 out of this vote, and tbe year ended with a liability to local bodies of £143,860, and for entrusted to the staff of the Department £292,386, or a total unexpsndfid authorities actually given of £436,246. There has been some discussion as to whether New Z m 1 md should cow undertake tbo measurement of an arc of the earh's surface in this part of the globe. Such an operation is contemplated in the Surveyor-General's report of 1877, and thojld the Government now think it desii able to make this contribution to science, the work could be dune willingly bv more tnan one of tho highly-trained olßcsrs of the Department. The measurement arid computations would, of course, require saveral years' wo.k, arid would coat a considerable nam