NEW GUINEA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 9335, 19 October 1893, Page 6

NEW GUINEA.

Jn his last report on New Guinea, Sir William McGregor, the Administrator of that possession, makes the following remarks regarding cultivation in New Guinea: —"About'.'ooo cocoanuts were planted on the mainland, at what appeared a suitable glace, nearly opposite Tauko. In all the Government has now planted, in round numbers,, about 15,000 cocoanuts. It is considered to be very desirable that this be still further extended. If successful these plantations cannot but be an important item of revenue in half a score of years, and they will help to bring about direct shipments to the ports where cocoanuts are used for manufacturing purposes, a change which will be found necessary to the full development of the cocoanut industry in British New Guinea. For that industry one can with certainty predict a great future in the possession, as it is provided with local cheap labour, and the cocoanut flourishes in the greatesb luxuriance, and is never devastated by hurricanes there. Writing as to land procurable in that island for cultivation, he says :—" There is no doubt that areas of good land of a few hundred acres each are procurable at very many places in the possession, suitable for almost any form of tropical cultivation. This seems to offer a good field to industrious men with Bmall capital. Such land can be alienated to the bom fide settler at a minimum price of 2s 6d an acre. There is every reason to believe that men with some knowledge of the cultivation and preparation for the market of tobacco, tea, coffee, vanilla, bananas, fibres, cocoanuts, etc., would find good local labour and soil and climate suited to any branch they took up. The natives in some of the best agricultural districts show some aptitude for cultivating new products, and they would probably soon imitate systematic cultivation for export."