STEADY GROWTH

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 9, 11 January 1929, Page 7

STEADY GROWTH

OVER SIX .MILLIONS

AUSTRALIA'S POPULATION ■TEN ■YEAES' MGUEES United Press Association— By Electric Telegraph— Copyrleht (Beceived lith January, 11 a.m.) . . . . SYDNEY, This Day. . The analysis of the Commonwealth population for the ten years 1917 to 1927, compiled by ,the Commonwealth Statistician, shows that the population increased by 1,252,791 to 6,234,854, representing an ; average rate of increase of 2.27 per cent, per annum.' . .''-."

(From "The Post's" Ropresantatlve.) ' • " . SYDNEY, 3rd Jan. From figures available up to the end of September, the Commonwealth Statistician computes that the population of Australia is 6,310,453,. New South Wales having the largest quota —more than 2,ooo,ooo—and Victoria boasting, truly boasting, a population of 1,700,000. Eapid 'advances in population are now less marked, and it is considered in official circles that the approach to the 7,000,000 will be very slow. However, official prognostications are not always reliable, and in other quarters it is considered that the advance will continue to be rapid. It is pointed out that it is only 140 years since the first fleet reached Sydney, establishing a white population of 1035; therefore it must be concluded that the British race has done well wjth the great island.continent. IThe long table which, in the official bulletin, gives.the yearly population of Australia and the States since the first colonisation has all the dullness and rigidity of cold type as used by a Government Printer, but he who lets his eye rove between the lines will glimpse all the colour and movement of a scattered people struggling into manhood. It ia seen, for instance, that for 17 years New South Wales was Australia. Melbourne comment is that Sydney people think that the position is unchanged. The table shows that in 1803 Tasmania came into the picture with a population of 177. Western Australia followed in 1829 with 1003, then came South Australia in 1836 with 546. On separation from the Mother State in 1851 Victorians numbered 97,489; and in 1859, when Queensland became entitled to her own supplies of red tape, she had a population of 23,520. With sis States thus established, Australia's population was 1,097,395, made up as follows: — New South Wales, 327,459; Victoria, 521,072; Queensland, 23,520;, South Australia, 122,7313; Western Australia, 14,837; Tasmania, 87,682.

Then Victoria had a greater ■population than New .South Wales, a fact that surprises many people nowadays. But it was an accepted thing nearly 40 years ago, for such was the power of gold. It was three years after separation, in 1854—the year cf Hip Eureka stockade— that yietoria's population jumped over-40,000 above that of the parent State, "and it was not until 1802 that she yielded the numerical supre-, maey, after a neck-and-neck race tlirough the 'eighties.

There has beiSn some discussion lately among 1 scientists as to , the number of people which Australia can ultimately support. The United States takes pride in'a'population of 120,000,000, • which", provides an enormous home market for primary and secondary industries. Australia, if we are to judge from the consensus of scientific opinion, cannot hope for a population of that'size owing to the dryness of its interior. The population which the country can support with the assurance of a comfortable standard has been authoritatively estimated at 20,000,000. But quality will count before quantity.