The Waikato Times AND THAMES VALLEY GAZETTE. Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatsoever state or persuasion, religious or political. SATURDAY, JULY 28, 1888.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2504, 28 July 1888, Page 2

The Waikato Times AND THAMES VALLEY GAZETTE. Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatsoever state or persuasion, religious or political. SATURDAY, JULY 28, 1888.

At the annual local meeting of shareholders of the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Agency Company held in Auckland on Wednesday last, the chairman, Dr. Campbell, in his address, referred to the means necessary to restore prosperity to the colony. In the course of his remarks, Dr. Campbell said :

As the prosperity of this company may be said to depend wholly on the agricultural and pastoral interests of the colony, I may be permitted to make one or two remarks bearing on the question. The retrenchment toc3in resounds aloud

throughout the land, deafening the ear and obscuring the jndgment; but beyond doubt good work is being done in that direction. But, gentlemen, it is not by retrenchment alone that true prosperity can be brought back to the colony, and I think I am justified in saying that as yet the Government has made no movement nor shown any sign of grappling with the difficulty, and seizing the only remedy which oan bring us permanent relief. The one and only rem sdy is the extended occupation, of the soil by placing practical farmers on our country lands, by a system of assisted immigration and money being advanced, as now in operation in America and Canada. . We may retrench here a little, and there a great deal, but after all the colony will only be a little less or a little more in debt, but it will have remained as to progress in stain tjita, :mJ it will not have advanced in material prosperity, and I confidently assert that it cannot and won't advance until it has fallen buck on the only true source of wealth to nil nations—that which proceeds from the occupation und cultivation of the soil. We must have a greatly increased agricultural population, or we most assuredly will retrograde. There is now a great cry gone forth of protection to native industries. Verily, we are almost asked to believe that the establishment of a score or two factories is going to bring about such a great wave of prosperity that depression and hard times shall know ns no more. No greater delusion than this can exist. Manufactures! What are these compared to agriculture ? . . . I quote from a London journal : " The annual value of the agricultural produce of the United Kingdom is about £300,000,000. This is double the produce of her looms, three times the produce of her forges, and four or five times a year's produce of her mines." The general belief prevails that England owes her greit wealth to her vast manufactures. But these figures prove that, after all, we must fall back upon our mother earth to yield us our great and abiding support and tustimnce, for from her only our true and permanent prosperity can come. Such being the case, can there be auy doubt as to the direction in which our statesmen ought to concentrate their whole energies?

These words from a leading citizen of the commercial metropolis of the colony, and the mouthpiece of one of our most powerful mercantile institutions, are worthy of attention, for they are founded on incontrovertible economic truths and actual facts. It is remarkable how the force of circumstances has brought to pass a change of opinions as to the position between town and country. Not very long ago, when all manner of speculations were at fever heat in Auckland, the belief prevailed in commercial circles that the city could flourish independently of the country. The fact is no longer ignored, and ifc should never have been forgotten, that the most important factor in the wealth and greatness of a nation are its agricultural interests. We have repeatedly urged this view of the question upon the public, and have argued that nothing but an increase of population, the steady settlement of our waste lands, and the most liberal encouragement, by these and other means, of the pastoral and agricultural industries of the colony, would restore vitality and progress to it. Though we thoroughly believe in Free-trade principles, whose universality and broad catholicity will ultimately triumph as the world advances, nevertheless we would at this moment set aside the controversial contest between us and the. Protectionists to give precedence to the claims of agriculture and settlement. We may be pardoned for repeating ourselves, but if our readers will refer to our articles of the 19th and 26th April last, in which, amongst others we have written on this question, it will be seen that we have consistently and persistently advocated the prosecution of a liberal system of land settlement. No one who has a due regard for the welfare of the country, and studies the subject, can fail to see

that unless the country interests receive the highest consideration and care at the hands of the Legislature and Government, neither retrenchment, much as we all desire it, nor severe taxation, however tentative it may be for merely revenue-raising, will lift the colony from its depression and despondency. On the 19th April, we wrote as follows :— The hona fide settlement of the waste lands of the colony by the most liberal policy that can be devised in order to stay the tide of emigration that seems to threaten a denudition of our best population is a question of paramount importance that must be dealt with without losh of time, and with unprejudiced minds, if the colony is to be placed in a position to regain healthy prosperity. Side by aide with this question ia that of railway reform, for. without a complete reversal of the existing system in vogue in our railway business, the settlement of the country ia an utter impossibility* Then, on the 26th of the same month, showing how inadequately the country districts had benefited by the Public Works expenditure, we concluded with the following remarks :— Prosperity cannot be won back until the greatest of national industries. Agriculture, in stimulated and promoted in the most liberal manner that can be devised, and to do this the settlement of the country and waste lands of the Crown must be the first object that should occupy the serious consideration of Parliament. Both Parliament and country are favourable to vigorous measures being undertaken to introduce population into the colony to occupy the land, but the Government, if we can judge by late utterances of the Minister of Lands, do not readily fall in with public opinion in this respect and are not disposed to enter more actively into the work of colonisation than has already characterised their past policy. The capital invested in agriculture in the United Kingdom is two thousand two hundred and ninety millions, compared with three hundred and sixty-eight millions in manufactures and five hundred and eighty - eight millions in Commerce. The vast superiority of the former interests accounts for the immense accumulated wealth of the British Isles, their increasing prosperity and expanding trade. The Times of June 11th, in an able article on British trade and its improved aspects, refers to the large excess of the total value of imports over the total value of exports, and regards the fact as A proof that the United Kingdom has

attained such a position of pecuniary independence ns to bo able to syen 1 more than from day to day it earns from sales to customers outside. A land which is regularly in the habit of importing less than itexports may be presumed cither to possess an unusally extensive variety of produce within its own * territory or to have little accumulated capital. An excess of imports is a fact in which the country ought to be congratulated rather than condoled with. The comfortable normal state of British trade is an excess of the value of imports, showing purchasing ability beyond the sum represented by the value of the goods we sell to foreigners. Now, the converse to this is the case with New Zealand. The value of our exports is largely in excess of the value of the imports, indicating that real wealth is not accumulating with us, that the purchasing power of the colony has shrunk and that we are sending out more value than we receive in return. In everyone of the other colonies the imports exceed the exports. With trifling exceptions, the whole of our exports are products of the soil. If by liberal land regulations adapted to all classes of people, without or with capital, combined with nominal railway rates, we could attract an uninterrupted stream of immigrants to fill up the sparse-peopled regions of the colony, not only would the internal trade revive, but there would be a large accession te the capital of the country and a corresponding increase to our power to purchase from abroad, that is, our imports would swell to higher proportions. A revival in our greatest national industry by increasing its numerical strength and productive energies can be the only true method to add to the opulence of the country. Population will enlarge the limits of the home consumption of our agricultural produce, and though it would also increase our exports, the imports would reach the point in the compass that indicates the possession of substantial wealth of our own.