DEAR LAND.

Taranaki Daily News, 27 June 1919, Page 6

DEAR LAND.

DOES NOT SPELL PROSPERITY. Says the Oamaru Mail:— Two hundred pounds per acre would be the price of good farming land in Elthara district if the dried milk industry were established, says the local paper. Already land in Taranaki realises about half this price, and one wonders where the increase is going to stop. Soldiers' applications for sections are accumulating as the transports arrive and prices are rising with the increasing demands.' The prices quoted for land seem to spell prosperity, but the most prosperous are those who sell at such prices—prices often in excess of the returns which the land affords. The margin of profit allowed the man who works the land is not so generous as that which is reaped by the man Who works the oracle, so that he gets his gain up to the last dime. There was a time when those who took up land in New Zealand got it at a price that allowed a margin to provide for bad seasons and other misfortunes which even farmers are called upon to suffer. That time is past. Those who take up land now, unless they are fortunate enough to draw thei lucky marble in a ballot for original State sections, are only too forcibly reminded that hnd is a luxury, and that those who acquire it at the, market price after it has passed from hand to hand during a half century must not "haste to be rich." W arc concerned about the soldiers who are being persuaded that the Government are doing something special for them in the way of providing settlement lands. They are in most cases paying "too dearly for their whistle," and numerous rearrangements of the terms attaching to their holdings will inevitably occur in the near future. The legislation which was supposed to help the soldiers in return for their priceless services is futile. It was conceived in a spirit of deep consideration for others, t\nd the prices paid, in the face of desperate need for the commodity, was not the true value, but the price which the owners chose to demand, though there was often a show, for decency's sake, of careful, and discreet negotiation.