300,000 Acres of Wheat to be Sown

Manawatu Times, Volume 66, Issue 96, 23 April 1941, Page 8

300,000 Acres of Wheat to be Sown

Per Press Association. CHRISTCHURCH, April 22. The district allocations in the 300,000acre wheat sowing which it is hoped will be made this season have been announced by the Director of Primary Production, Mr R. B. Tennent, through the Wheat Committee. The detailed sowing programmes are estimated as follows: Canterbury, north of Rakaia, 103,000 acres; Ashburton, 74,500 acres; South Canterbury, 57,000 acres; North Otago, including Waitaki, 18,000 acres; Dunedin coastal, 12,500 acres; Otago Central and Maniototo, 4500 acres; Southland, 9500 acres; Marlborough, 8500 acres; Nelson, 1500 acres; Hawke’s Bay, 2000 acres; Wellington, 9000 acres. In elaborating the statement, the general manager of the Wheat Committee, Mr R. McPherson, said that on an average yield of 32.31 bushels an acre, 300,000 acres would supply the Dominion’s requirements this season. The yield was estimated at 35 bushels to the acre. , Very few people realised, he said, that every week of the year an average of 5000 tons of wheat was consumed for all purposes. To sow the area aimed at would require 13.000 tons of seed wheat. New Zealand’s fowl population accounted for nearly 1000 tons of wheat a week, or about 1,750,000 bushels a year. Except for a small quantity held back for seed, the balance of 4000 tons a week was made into flour and wheat ineal for human consumption and bran and pollard.