THE Thames Star MONDAY, AUGUST 12, 1929. THE DRIFT FROM THE LAND.

Thames Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 17661, 12 August 1929, Page 4

THE Thames Star

MONDAY, AUGUST 12, 1929. THE DRIFT FROM THE LAND.

“With malic® toward® none; with charity for nil; with firmneas in the rrght, as God given ue to see the right.”—Linceln.

The decline of rural population has been an unsatisfactory feature of our statistics for many years. A speaker at the Agricultural Bureau Conference declared that there were to-day 130,000 fewer people on the land in New South Wales than there were seven years ago. The same trend obtains in this Dominion. In America the same unsatisfactory feature was. noted, and the Americans, with characteristic energy, have decided to spend £20,000,000 on measures designed to restore the prosperity, and thereby the popularity of the industries directly associated with production from the land. It is a fact, however, that although people are rushing away from the land there still exists a great land-hunger. A few days ago there were 1300 odd approved applicants for a western block. Every time blocks are thrown open for selection there are always. hundreds of applicants in excels. Yet the land population is dwindling and production.' from the land is diminishing. Why? It appears to be plain that men are not shrinking from the arduous work of agriculture or from the loneliness of country life. The economic factor must be the reason why men leave ,the land; and it is obvious that the factors are high cost of land, high cost of machinery, and all the requisites the farmer has to use and the high cost of labour. These factors have (says an Australian paper) virtually killed the mining industry. To-day the number of metalliferous mining fields actually producing in Australia can be counted on the fingers of one hand. 'The ore bodies at Cobar, Nvmagee, Burraga, and various other centres in New South Wales, not to mention other States, are lying untouched because the ore costs too much to raise. The bugbear of cost has closed them all down, ; and although intrepid men are still game to give agriculture a try, if costs do not come down agriculture will .share the fate of mining, and will die, too. It is no use hoping to settle the open spaces by importing farmers. No importations can do with our land what our own sons, bred on the soil, cannot do. . "We must overcome the great handicap of excessive costs of production and transport; find the markets for the commodities when grown; and then the problem of our rural development and the settlement of our outback areas will rapidly solve itself.