OUR PRODUCTIVE POWER.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 216, 12 September 1929, Page 6

OUR PRODUCTIVE POWER.

The figures just issued by the Statistical Department dealing with the Dominion's production during the last ten years are of a most encouraging and inspiring character. Within this past decade the total annual value of our products has risen from about £87,000,000 to £120,000,000, though the level of prices for 1927-2S was substantially less than for 1918-19. As a natural consequence of the immense increase in the volume of our butter and cheese exports, dairy products, including other minor farm products, show an increase in value of £13,000,000, while the increase of only £ 2,000,000 in pastoral products reflects the comparative falling-off in our wool returns. One of the most remarkable facts disclosed by the figures is the solid progress of our secondary industries during this°decennial period. For though the value of our factory products fell off slightly last year as compared with 1926-27, the returns show a rise of nearly £10,000,000 or an average of £1,000,000 a "year, above the level recorded in 1918-19. The average value of our production per head of population has risen during this period from £74 to £84; and as the volume of our production in these ten years has risen 41 per cent, the people of New Zealand ha\e every reason to be gratified with the evidences of prosperity supplied by these statistical! returns. i