THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, AUGUST 19, 1935 POPULATION STATISTICS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22191, 19 August 1935, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, AUGUST 19, 1935 POPULATION STATISTICS

| The likelihood of a stationary popuI lation in this country is impressed by the annual statistical report just issued. "Even a declining one" and "within the immediate future" are phrases used in the report as attention is called to significant figures. By these the opinion is justified. The figures are trustworthy. While some details in the report are necessarily estimates only, those relevant to the broad field of inquiry—total population, migration and vital statistics — are precise; the methods of the Census and Statistics Office, although handicapped in other respects by the omission of the usual quinquennial census in 1931, ensure that these major particulars are more than estimates. On their showing, "the stage now reached in the movement of population is undoubtedly the most momentous in the history of New Zealand." The "European" population, for well over a hundred years, has had an unbroken growth, in spite of slackening tendencies from time to time. At the beginning of the nineteenth centuiy there was a somewhat fluctuating occupation by sealers and whalers, to the number of possibly ti hundred. By 1839, at the end of the period preceding British possession, this number, increased by the addition of traders, missionaries and other settlers, rose to about a thousand. Colonising enterprises in the forties, the gold rushes of the sixties, the developmental policy of public works and assisted immigration during the seventies and early eighties, sent the totals rapidly up. To that point the increase was mainly due to the arrival of immigrant's; liince that time the natural increase—excess of birth's over deaths—lias been the dominant factor. However, while the proportionate contribution, of the factors has varied, there has been an unbroken record of growth. It comes, therefore, with something of a shock, except to those closely watching recent tendencies, to be told that the inflowing tide is so slackening that it is on the point of going out. Analysis of available figures reveals irregularity of the migration increase and comparative steadiness of the natural increase, throughout the Dominion's history. To be noted with gravity, however, is the fact of a declining birth-rate. The favourable ratio of natural increase has been aided by a. very low death-rate, which for man 3' years has been the lowest in the world. But a further fall in this is not to be expected. Indeed, as the report reasonably anticipates, basing its forecast on the marked appearance of an ageconstitution of the population less favourable than formerly, an increase in the death-rate will occur. Thus the natural increase would be diminished even if the birth-rate were maintained. The fall in the latter is considerable. From an annual average of 41.21 per 1000 of mean population in 1876-80 it went down to 18.80 in 1930, and since then, year by year, it has fallen to 18.42, 17.09, 16.59 and 16.47. Highly probable is the retarding effect of adverse economic conditions in recent years, but whatever comfort may be gleaned—taking the statistical point of view—from this consideration, it should be remembered that the fall, while probably accentuated by these conditions, was not created by them. It was quite as perceptible from 1901 to 1930. Nor is the outlook one whit improved by noting a similar trend in other countries. Merely to take the statistical viewpoint, this accompanying fall, suggesting a tendency widely obtaining, adds to disquiet by its evidence of a prevailing influence in which this country has been caught. Dread of a malady is not removed but rather intensified by the knowledge that its incidence is wide; all the more is its ultimate causa likely to be deepseated and difficult to remove.

When the economic bearing of an external participation in this disability is noted, attention should be given to some injurious possibilities of importance to this country. The report instances among population movements elsewhere the trend in Britain, where the population of England and Wales is calculated to have reached its peak level and a steep decline of considerable magnitude seems to be inevitably and rapidly appioaching: this would mean for New Zealand a substantial shrinking of its principal market. A further economic probability of ominous meaning arises from this Dominion's own diminishing birthrate. Its children under ten years of age at the census of 1926 numbered 267,227 ; at April 1 of this year the number under that age was estimated to be 251,706, a decrease of 15,521, although the total population

had increased by 140,577: such a diminution must have an injurious effect on economic demand and so on employment —in food-production, manufacturing, teaching and other services. The whole of the facts, when their economic implications are examined, must be gravely regarded. A stationary population, much more a declining one, would check development and impose individual burdens that an increase of numbers would lighten. In a country of ample natural resources there is abundant room for steady increase. A fewyears ago a decreasing Maori population was the subject of much thought; now the Maori is increasing more rapidly than the pakeha—and the comparison, whatever else may be drawn from it, adds to the impressiveness of this awakening report.