PASTORAL AREAS WANTED

Taranaki Daily News, 23 August 1930, Page 28 (Supplement)

PASTORAL AREAS WANTED

KEEN DEMAND IN CANTERBURY. INE.vPE RIENCED A PPLICANTS. The greater number of enquiries for land In Canterbury, Mr. W. Stewart, Commissioner of Crown Lands for Canterbury, stated last week in reply to a reporter’s enquiry, is for pastoral count l- /, for which there is always a keen demand. To meet this demand would necessitate the acquisition of lands in occupation, as there is no virgin Crown land in Canterbury available. To acquire pastoral country would be too expensive, Mr. Stewart explained. Some pastoral country had been offered to ‘he Government, but the cost of establishing men on it was prohibitive; it was estimated at £7OOO or £BOOO per man; for the same amount two men could be established on dairy farms, or on areas to be utilised for intense agricultural farming. For areas other than pastoral, it was found that the demand was not so keen as it was represented to be twelve months ago. Mr. Stewart thought that the slump in the prices of primary products had something to do with the lessened demand. Valuations were not reduced, Mr. Stewart said, on account of temporary slumps in the market. The practice waste value over a period, the basis being the value of the returns from the land over seven or ten years. The Act provided for the reduction of values in respect of leases of land acquired under the Land for Settlements Act, and during the past eighteen months applications for revaluation of these settlement leases had been granted.

The type of enquirers for land varied, hut recently there had been a fairly large number of applicants without any capital and with very little experience of farming; in most instances probably the enquirers had had general labourers’ experience. The attitude of some of these enquirers appeared to be that as it was costing the State something to keep them while they were unemployed, it would be a better proposition if’the State gave them a farm.