World population density

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32901, 27 April 1972, Page 6

World population density

“I returned to Christchurch this week to find that I had been misreported in your paper on April 13,” Mr P. A. Williams, president of Ecology Action, writes, In a letter to the editor of “The Press.”

Mr Williams was referring to the address he gave to the annual meeting of the Christchurch branch of the New Zealand Family Planning Association. The report was headed, “N.Z. growth ‘should be limited’.” "My comments on the population density in the year 2044 applied to the world as a whole, when it is estimated that all the arable and urban land will be as densely populated as the city of Auckland. Large areas of agriculturally inferior land will be much less crowded and the mountains and plateaus will still be largely unpopulated. “I am more distressed, however, by the report of my comments on Maoris and children. I wish to make it quite clear that it is only their idea of the desirable number of children that I consider ‘archaic,’ but that the values they have on the place of children in society and the home are ‘beautiful.’ Pakeha society needs more of the Maori attitude in a qualitative sense, but not a quantitative one. “The fact that by the year 2000, 75 per cent of the popu-

lation of New Zealand will have a significant proportion of Maori blood is no matter of concern to me apart from the fear that it may mean the whole population of New Zealand may be increasing at an even faster rate than it is now.” [Our reporter comments: "Mr Williams was not misreported. In discussing world population density he included a specific reference to New Zealand. His address covered a very wide subject, and perhaps he did not have time to qualify all his statements?!