AGRICULTURAL PROGRESS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3111, 9 February 1909, Page 3

AGRICULTURAL PROGRESS.

NOKTH AND SOUTH. COMPARISONS. The statistics given in the latest issue of the New Zealand Official Year Book, which has just made its appearance, supply son:e intere.?:i"g comparisons regarding the agricultural progress of the North and South Islands. According to tin se statistics, the North Island, with only about half the area of land in occupation as compared with the South Island, is exporting nearly twice as much produce. This fact must come as a surprise to those people who still believe that the South has a monopoly of good farms and good farmers. The North Island, out of a total area of 28,459,520 acres, has 14,901,294 acres in occupation. The South Island, with a total area of 37,456,000 acres, has 22,033,777 acres in occupatiuti.

The North Island in 1907 exported produce, the bulk of which came from the land, to the value oi £12,204,901. The South Island's exports were £7,836,601, or only 39.1 of the Dominion's total exports.

Unfortunately, the Official Year j Book, although not published for some months after the close of the produce year, which is now deemed to end on September 31st, does not contain figures for the 1907-1908 season, but from other sources it is ascertained that the exports for the North Island for the year just completed were valued at £10,012,760, while those for the South Island amounted to £6,070,034, showing a balance in favour of the North Island equalling nearly £4,000,U00.

The latest total returns for the Dominion, of course, show the regrettable decrease of over £3,500,000, which is accounted for largely by the fall in wool values and by the decrease in several other products. In calculating this decrease wool accounts for £1.708,800, butter for £508,977, frozen meat for £396,814, sheepskins, tallow, etc., for over £300,000. It is difficult to realise that the North Island, with 7,737,483 acres less in occupation than the South, has a year'y export of about £4,000,000 more in produce. Of course, in the totals quoted there are exports which cannot be classed as agricultural, but they form only a small proportion of the whole, and as this class of exports is about equal for both islands, the figures given are reliable for the purpose of comparison. No one will deny that the South Island has been farmed in a much more intensive fashion than the North, and has had better opportunities for developing the resources of its soil. It has had a much better command of capital. It is infinitely better roaded and has some hundreds of miles more of railways. It lies not had forests to fell to any extent in order to make pastures, for much of its farming and pastoral country was naturally grassed., and lay ready for the pioneer settlers to stock or to cultivate. It has not had devastating Maori wars to hamper its settlement, nor has it suffered, as the North suffers even now, from the paralysing effects of native land ownership, and yet with nearly twice as much land in occupation it carries less population, and produces some millions of pounds a year less than the North.

It is so widely believed that the South Island is averagely more fertile and better farmed than the North that the discrepancy in production will require some explanation. Facts, however, are hard things to move by argument, and, allowing that the Southern farmer is just as good a man as his Northern brother, the only way of accounting for tha much greater production of the North is "better climate and better so ; l."

Perhaps the most striking feature j in this comparison of the two islands is the percentage increase of exports ( from the four chief centres, which is a fair indication of the development of the four chief provinces. During the pastes years, Auckland shows an increase of 180.6 per cent., Wellington 160.2 per cent., Dunedin 37.7 per cent., and Lytteltou 26 per cent. That the ratio of increase is greatest during recent years no one will doubt who has studied New Zealand ; statistics, and that it will continue i in the future is to be expected ftr ' various reasons. in the first place i little more that half the occupied j land in the North is developed up to ' anything like its full capacity, and in the second place the 13,558,226 acre 3 at present unoccupied contains some of the finest land in the Dominion, and only about 900,000 j acres are deemed unfit for settlement of some sort. On the other hand the 14,817,223 acres of occupied land in the South includes nearly 9,000,000 acres of mountain tops and country utterly unfit for any kind of settlement, and the balance consists chiefly of inferior second and third-class country, which on account of climatic or other difficulties is not likely to be highly productive. Still another interesting comparison may be made between the two islands in the way of values; for taxation purposes.' In 1891 the capital value of the North Island was assessed at £57,441,115, and the South Island at £64,783,914. In 1908 the values for the North had risen to £149,783,914, and the South to £103,656,258. The increase of £92,342,799 for the Nortn during ; this period of seventeen years represents an advance of 160.76 per cent., j while the advance for the South Is- : land represents only 60 per cent. [ That tiiis great increase is not made by the growth of towns is stiown by the fact that the total increase for counties during the same period was ' £162,289,950, and for boroughs (which includes every town) was £91,150,222, and this dilference is accentuated by the fact that during this period the value of property in ! boroughs was added to by the constitution of 25 new boroughs, and the inclusion of 23 town districts, which, of course, correspondingly reduced the total of county values. Whatever be the cause for this striking difference in values and production, it is a fact which every political representative should closely study and freely recognise. There need be no question of anything Out friendly emulation between the two great geographical divisions of the Dominion if our statesmen only real-

ise the true meaning of such comparisons as have just been made, but when the allocation of monetary grants and the construction of railways are lieeider! '"i vvith<u: regf.rl to present i-r corsi - erations, then, unfortunately, there will be the old cry raised of North versus South.