THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1910. THE DEMAND FOR FOOD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVII, Issue 14492, 5 October 1910, Page 6

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1910. THE DEMAND FOR FOOD.

While the New Zealand Government is making a pretence of encouraging settlement, and is doing its passive utmost to lock settlers from unproductive Crown and Native Lands, the world's demand for food becomes more clamorous year by year. In Austro-Hungary, under an agrarian policy which carries agricultural protection to the point of exclusion of foreign competition, the popular outcry against high prices is forcing the hand of the Governments concerned to the admission of restricted quantities of Argentine meat; in London, colonial importers are informing members of the Vienna Chamber of Commerce that Australian and New Zealand meats are respectively equal and superior. That Continental embargoes against meat-importations are destined to be greatly modified in the near future is very evident, for the growth of population throughout Central Europe has exceeded the possibilities of the local supply, and will compel the authorities, without in any way sacrificing the. legitimate claims of their agriculturists, to supplement this supply from abroad. The United States, another populous and rapidly-increasing country, is very similarly situated in relation to its meat-supply, and must inevitably become a heavy consumer of imported meat and butter within a few years. The British market already absorbs at good prices all the meat and butter that New Zealand can furnish, so that any extension of markets must be provided for by those countries which are free to develop their productive capacity. That New Zealand could greatly assist in feeding the hungry millions of Europe and America is known to every person acquainted with the actual position in the back blocks. There is not a back block county in the North Island which is not blotted by great stretches of unoccupied country, locked against settlement under various pretexts. Yet in the face of a world crying for food and ready to pay highly remunerative prices for our agricultural produce, the Government makes no effort worthy the name to enable waiting settlers to avail themselves of the golden opportunity. Mr. Fowlds professed, in Sydney, to believe that artisans, not settlers, were leaving New Zealand. Many artisans are certainly leaving—and why? Is it not because the general industrial development of our cities is being checked, in spite of the progress made by Auckland, owing to the refusal of the Government to permit the country to be brought under

cultivation? That one man should have to leave New Zealand to look for work under the existing circumstances is an impeachment of the land-policy of the Administration. The difficulty undoubtedly is that a most lamentable amount of ignora,nce exists in our cities concerning the economic relations of Town and Country, and concerning the actual conditions existing throughout the agricultural districts. Ministers and other party apologists, instead of exerting themselves to remove this ignorance and to bring Town and Country intio hearty co-operation for the common good,; foster and strengthen it. They talk of " great estates" as a blight upon the community, while sedulously concealing the fact that practically the only " great estates" in our islands are held by the Crown or by the Natives, and that these great estates are unproductive and burdensome. Continually peeping through the arguments and apologies and. explanations of Ministers is the barbaric theory that though there are " a few million acres" which are not now in effective occupation, these areas will be wanted by generations to come. This style of argument particularly appeals to city audiences, which appear to have a vague belief that though city-dwellers are not eagering for the back blocks at the present time, their children or grandchildren or great-grandchildren may be so inclined. Could anything >e more absurd? Our people are emigrating already because the development of our natural resources is not permitted to keep pace with our general progress. Great regions in Europe, in America, and in Asia are becoming so densely populated that they cannot to-day produce sufficient food for their peoples. New Zealanders are asked to think—in the face of these facts—that it is good policy to maintain a preserve for a hereditary Maori aristocracy of the future, and to lock up many million acres as a reserve against problematic necessities. If New Zealand were fully settled, and were possessed of the great secondary industries which can only follow in the wake of a great agricultural development, she would carry with ease many millions of people, and be in a position to secure for her swarming population other lands and other opportunities—as Britain has done in the past. But if New Zealand remains largely unsettled, and generally crippled in the great secondary industries which require large populations to support them, is anybody credulous enough to imagine that she will be left, by the nations of the earth, to plod along in her own short-sighted way The Government may be strong enough in its blindness to drive loyal New Zealah'ders overseas, and to establish a privileged Maori aristocracy whose Board-collected rents will furnish handsome pickings for pakeha politicians. But will every future Government of our -'-artificially restricted population be strong enough to prevent some hungry and crowded State from questioning our national title? New Zealand has now an unprecedented opportunity to make good its effective occupation of every available acre. There are hosts of willing settlers waiting permission to create farms from the wilderness. Prices of agricultural produce are good and the no::.} • f the world for food promises a continuance of good and encouraging prices. The only thing lacking is an Administration which will take advantage of the opportunity, and will devote its best energies to the settlement of our waste lands and to the making of roads, bridges, and railways, which will make every agricultural district accessible.