PROSPEROUS TARANAKI.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 287, 13 May 1915, Page 3

PROSPEROUS TARANAKI.

■, OIL WELLS AND IRON. I HIGH PRICED LANDS. (New Zealand Herald Special Coramis sioner.) ' It is a pleasure to visit the Taranaki towns of to-day; they are so clean and prosperous, so well equipped with all the modern conveniences of life. I never quite realised in the old times what a really charming place New Plymouth was. In most parts of the world it would be famous for its beauty, its public gardens are unrivalled, the wonderful blend of native trees and giant ferns with Old World poplars, oaks, and pines; the lakes with their wild fowl; tho shady walks are delightful, and from every elevation magnificent views of sea and coast, are seen, and the wonderful mountain Egmont. It is a pity Captain Cook gave it an English name, its old name Taranaki means so much more, for the mountain is Taranaki. I saw Egmont many times, and always under some new aspect. Once it was clothed entirely in white fleecy clouds that fitted its shape to perfection, and the bright autumn sun shining on it made it look like burnished silver. Another time grey mists hid its base, and its snow-covered summit was crimson with, sunset; and the most striking of all was when a transparent mist was over it like a thin veil over a woman's face and clouds circled about its summit and shafts of golden sunlight lit up its snows. 1 have been told that the sacred mountain of Japan is no more wonderful or beautiful than Mount Egmont. If it is so, I am not surprised that an artistic people should worship it, for such worship need be nothing more than a recognition of its wonder and beauty. The people of the four big cities may consider New Plymouth merely a provincial town, but none of them are so rich as it is in the comforts and attractions of life. It has three fine golf links, its racecourse is one of the showplaees of New Zealand, its playgrounds are innumerable, and it has more trout streams within fishing distance than any other town in the world. Best 'if | all, perhaps, are its pleasant homes and its prosperous people. i

NEW PLYMOUTH'S PROMISE. At present New Plymouth depends for its fhianciul wellbeing on dairying and frozen meat, but it hopes to become the oilopolis oftlie Dominion and a eoiire of iron manufacture. These two industries may add wealth when they become .successful, but they will certainly detract from its charm. I suppose a (food many people would like to know whether the New Plymouth oilfields are likely to be a success. 'A lot of money lias been spout in borings and buildings and refinery, but a lot more will have to be spent before the financial question can be ([>'■' finitely settled. Seven or eight wells have been sunk to depths from 2So(lr't. to about 4000 ft., and in each of the wells oil has been struck and in some cases is still flowing at a steady but slow rate. There are two distinct opinions regarding the future of the field. One maintains that if the we'ls are deepened or deeper wells sunk the main source of oil will be tapped. The other holds that sufficient oil could be won from the strata already pierced to keep the refinery going if only the number of wells were increased. I should certainly think that an effort 'should be made by a combination of the companies interested and by public subsidy to test the question of deeper supplies, for if a deej) well were successful, it would be a simple enough matter to deepen the present ones. As to the iron industry, well, iron was smelted from Taranaki ironsand 'JO years ago and it is being smelted now, but whether the present method will solve the financial problem has yet to be proved on a large scale. Perhaps we shall yet see some smart person utilise the illimitable supplies of natural gas gushing from every bore for smelting the iron ore. and for developing electrical energy and other purposes. Oil may or may licit spout, iroiisiind may or may not be profitably turned in. to bars of steel, but one tiling is absolutely certain: New Plymouth, like all the other Taranaki towns, will grow and thrive, whilst agriculture grows and thrives and there is room in Taranaki for very big agricultural growth. New Plymouth people have faith in the future of their town. They have nearly completed an ocean harbor, which is to attract ocean steamers, and enterprising merchants expect the place to rival Auckland or Wellington some day. If the oil industry succeeds and tlie iron industry is established and the Taranaki farmer ceases to depend upon grass and takes up intensive cultivation, New Plymouth lias a very good chance of becoming an important centre of import and export.

A PRODUCTIVE DISTRICT. I do not suppose tliero is n, mora productive stretch of country in Xew Zealand at the jircsont time'than that along each side of the forty-odd miles of railway between Xew Plymouth and Haw-era. There seems to Yv a town about every four miles, and look at their populations—llawera. over .'WOO, Stratford over 30110, New Plymouth 8000, liurU-wood l.")<) 0, Klfham about 2000, and then there are several town districts besides. Rut it, is the counties which spread around these centres which tell the story. They average much loss than half the size e.f Auckland counties and yet look nt the registered value of their land and improvements—llawera county .€2 ! :>I,I.:V>.S. Stratford £2,M0.077, Taranaki .€_';>:)' i:, (7, Kltliam£l,r)()ti,!)in! Add the value of the boroughs and the town districts anil it will give some idea of the value of this little'slice of Taranaki.

T drove out bv way of the coastal road ami saw something of the country between Mount Kgmont and the sea. From Xew Plymouth to Opunake, from Opunnko to llawera. is a lovely stretch of land, v.iih a swift-running creek about every mile, and a farmhouse or two at les-e,- intervals. It is nearly all cut up into small holdings, and the price thai people are asking for these bold-'ii;-s would make a land reformer high. T visited one district where not'lorn,' ami the Government cut up an estate and sold it in small farms at from .CIS lo ij.'l) an acre. The same land will sell to-day at .OK) acre—some of it has been sc.ld at much more Iban this, and :■"»!(• of the men who bought from the Government have gone away with small fortunes in their pockets.

THfilT YAfXI-S AXD FIXAXCE. 1 talked to numerous classes of people about the ))!«? values triven for Taranaki lands, and I confess that I found very few people who were at all pessimistic on the subject. The worst fnrcbodini":'.

I iieard were: "If there is a slump in butter," "If cheese goes down to old prices," "If men don't farm properly," "If they keep poor cows," and "If they are too hampered with short-dated mortgages and high interest." I did not hear anyone say that under ordinary conditions .CflO or £7O or even £BO an acre land would not pay. After going into the financial and productive sides of tho question, I confess that, from a na- ; tional point of view, these high values i are a distinct advantage. They will I compel men to work such land to its. highest 'point of production; they will make the individual contribute more in the shape of rates and taxes; they will induce the dairyman to breed or liny cows that will yield up to 3001b or 5001b of butter-fat; "they will wipe out the. lazy farmer and the careless farmer and the inferior eow, and, above all, they will force the land into small holdings, which means close population and intensive cultivation. It is better for the nation that TaranakT lands should go up to £IOO an acre than that mciv should hold largo blocks of low-priced land in a low state of cultivation and a low state of production.

I VALUES IN THE FUTURE. , I am not going to prophesy regarding the future money values of Taranaki lands. That is a matter which chiefly concerns the individual. It is the productive value which is of chief importance to the State, and one need not hesitate to believe that this will increase beyond all present conception. I have seen land in Taranaki entirely under grass carrying at the rate of a; cow to the acre, and I have seen cows which yielded from £3O to £lO per year for butter-fat alone. These two things alone show how plain is the way to doiibling and trebling the wealth output of Taranaki. If Taranaki is so prosperous now, with only about one-third of its lands cultivated even up to the grass stage, and that one-third not nearly up to its maximum carrving capacity, what will it be when all'its lands' are occupied and fully used 7 If Tara- ] naki's cows, averaging little more than J 1801b of butter-fat for the season, can'j produce nearly £3,000,000 worth of butter and cheese, what will three times the I number do when the average yield of j butter-fat is 3001b for the season? And J the time is at hand when Taranaki farm- I crs will no longer depend entirely upon J grass for their incomes. Wherever one travels now, by railway or main road, one sees small a>'oas of' land under root and fodder crops, land being prepared for lucerne, land being cleared of stumps and logs, to prepare the way for future cultivation. Thousands upon thousands of acres of the best land in Taranaki are still occupied by stumps and logs. T!y the actual dead timber, T mean that which yields nothing except a dreary effect on the landscape.

EFFECTS OF ROADS AXD RAILWAYS. I could not help being struck with the fact that good roads and good railway communication have had a big effect upon Taranaki land values, and as a natural sequence, upon the production of wealth. Without them there would be no .Did or £7O an acre farms, no c'ose settlement, and, of course, none of the care and attention which makes high-priced land profitable. I have only to compare the land I saw adjacent to any of the Taranaki railways 'with the land 1 saw alongside that m'uddv. rutty Ohura road to realise that the o'nlv reason why there are no high-priced farms about the Ohura and no close settlement is simply because there is no passable means of communication. The land in the Ohura district is exactly similar to that in the best parts of Taranaki. a kindly papa formation, an old marine formation, calcareous c'ay or calcareous marl, essentially suitable for making good pasture, or for almost any class of farming. lam quite sure that if the Okahuluira-Stratford railway had been built ten years ago and all the connecting roads metalled, Matiorc and Uingaroa would have been towns of inmdrtance by now, and thousands upon thousands of acres, idle at the present time, would be productive farms, and the larger holdings along the road wo-i'd have been subdivided possibly ai'ain ami again, and so improved that -111 or 50 acres would be. yielding a man a -nod living. flow any Oovornment or (iovernment official who has ever «cen the Ohura country can find excuses for having it without a railway and v.i<t< ,ucJi impassable roads, is beyond my comprehension. Tt only goes to snow that the men we have e'ecfed or apnnmlod to look after the interests of this nominion have either not fully realised how dependent settlement is upon communication, or have not been adequately sup. ported by the general nublic in their efforts to carry roads and railway-, into districts needing them.