MANAWATU EVENING STANDARD. Circulation. 3,200 Copies Daily. FRIDAY, JANUARY 26, 1906. NEW ZEALAND'S SHEEP COUNTRY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 8198, 26 January 1906, Page 4

MANAWATU EVENING STANDARD. Circulation. 3,200 Copies Daily. FRIDAY, JANUARY 26, 1906. NEW ZEALAND'S SHEEP COUNTRY.

i mi The importance of developing the sheepbreeding industry in New Zealand must be apparent to anyone who has given the subject a moment's thought. It is the industry which in past years has given a great amount of wealth to this country, and even at the present time surpasses all other industries in its yearly output. Since 1855 the value of wool alone sent from New Zealand has reached the enormous total of i£90,422,599, and the yearly output averages about £5,000,000 worth. Besides wool there have been immense exports of frozen mutton and lamb. It is estimated that since 18S1 to the end of 1905 close on 48,000,000 carcases of sheep and lambs worth over £30,0013,000 have been sent from New Zealand to overseas markets. Add to this the value of pelts, tallow, live animals, bones, offal (turned into manure), and we have the immense total of £125,000,000 as the produce of New Zealand flocks during the last 50 years. It is, however, only during the last 15 years that the frozen meat industry has reached anything like large dimensions. Mr Gilbert Anderson, speaking not long ago of the value of this industry, showed what influence this trade has had on the progress of the country. He said : —" The frozen meat industry at once created the demand for steamships, and to this industry, and to it alone, do Me owe the magnificent lines of steamers that are now trading between New Zealand and Great Britain, and but for this industrv it is doubtful if one-fourth of these could continue to trade. Not only have we some 5S steamships, of an aggregate tonnage of 370,930 tons, at the disposal of the meat trade, but the fact of these steamers being here has reduced the freight on all other produce, as well as imports, besides facilitating the despatch of goods and giving the benefits of a quick return

and ready market. This industry lias also been the means of producing employment for about 3000 hands m our freezing works. It lias also made tlie employment of farm labourers constant and profitable. It provides a revenue of £"85,947 for our railways." It may be confidently stated that the value of she?]) and sheep products exported now from New Zealand averages at £9,000,000 yearly, and there is every reason to believe that we could double this annual output vrith comparative ease. There are, as has been pointed out on several occasions latel}', many millions of acres of native and Crown lands now lying' idle in the North Island. All these lauds can be made to carry sheep ; and besides these lands which are at present unoccupied and unstocked, there can be little doubtbut what the lands at present occupied could be so improved that they would carry nearly double the number of sheep now running on them. Statistics show that when the frozen meat trade was inaugurated in ISSI in New Zealand there were only 12,190/215 sheep in the colony, while at the present time we have nearly 20,(WO,000 sheep, in spile of the fact that we have consumed and exported since ISSI nearly 80,000,000 sheep and lambs. One of the greatest authorities on this subject I recently gave it as lus opinion that New Zealand had only commenced the freezing industry, and that we could go on largely increasing our exports of mutton and lamb and still further increase the number of sheep held in the colony.