Wairarapa Daily Times. [ESTABLISHED 1878.] WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 1893. THE OUTLOOK IN THE BUSH DISTRICTS.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XV, Issue 4456, 28 June 1893, Page 2

Wairarapa Daily Times. [ESTABLISHED 1878.] WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 1893. THE OUTLOOK IN THE BUSH DISTRICTS.

It is gratifying to learn that at the present time there is amongst settlers geuerally in the Bush districts a hopeful feeling which arises almost entirely from the expansion of the dairy industry and the future it offers to the man with a little land and very little capital. Many settlers have already made afairstart, whileothers complain that as yet they havo not had a reasonable chance, The demand for dairy stock in tho Bush led to it becoming a dep6t for aged cows and scrubby heifers, a class of animals which do not provo profitable in either a new or old settlement, iksbfelling also has unfortunately this season proved a disappointment to many who have been accustomed to depend upon this kind of employment. The fact is, capital is not available for such work until settlers have ; reached a stage when they will be able to obtain certificates of. title for their sections and borrow money on them, Improvements are to a large extent suspended till loan money is available I The idea that'men can go on land without capital and clear it without loans is cherished we know by the Liberal party, but in practice it means a suspension of improvements. : A. hundred thousand acres of bush'': could be profitably felled this season ! in the "Paliiatua County, hut the i capital necessary for doing the work : is not available and the. Government j j poiioy keeps hundreds'of wen idle |

who would otherwise be as busy as bees. If settlers- could pot their freeholds as their prtdpoessors oh tained tbem in old provincinl days, the condition of the Pahiatna County this winter, would be reversed. In stead oE five hundred men looking for employment, employment would be looking for five hundred men. On the Government works fair wages are being made, were it not for the broken weather, but iit many instances wi'h this drawback men earn only starvation wngoa, Settlers are alarmed, t00,.. at the number of outsiders who are being'sent up by the bureau, What is called a congestion in the labour market already exists, and the Government are inoreaisingit. Settlet s, too, in some of the new blocks are dis-heartr-nod by the backward stale of the surveys, and aro unable to get on their land. All round, as we said. before, there is a hopeful feeling, but this arises entirely from the prospects of the dairy industry, and a good time coming when, please the pig?, MrVecht's enterprise will bring corn to the settlers' mill. The main difficulty now is a want of capital. Improvements have been made up to a certain limit, but the majority of the new settlers have, for the'time, being, exhausted their own> resources, and so bushfelling contracts which were wont a year ago to provide for all surplus labour, sre now few and far back, What is needed is such a modification of the land regulations as would permit settlers to borrow for necessary improvements • of a reproductive oharactor.