LAND SUPPLIES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16336, 27 January 1921, Page 7

LAND SUPPLIES.

THE POSITION IMPROVING. (Special to the “Star. ") WELLINGTON, January 27. A fairly drastic clause in hist session’s Land Act will eventually make it difficult lor jier soils holding large areas of land in an unimproved state. It will pay them better to subdivide or t-o improve, otherwise their prospective unearned increment will lx> appropriated in yearly instalments through the penal land tax. Your correspondent inquired of the Hon I>. 11 Guthrie, Minister of Lands, if this clause has yet become operative. The ministerial reply was that the preliminaries were being undertaken, but no direct step has yet been taken. “However,” he added, “we feel the benefit of the clause in tho greater readiness of owners of large unimproved areas to submit their properties for soldier settlement at a reasonable figure. The position generally in regard to tho supply of improved an<l unimproved land for settlement has become more satisfactory. We have more land on offer, and tho prices asked are much more reasonable than has hitherto been the case, and nearer t-o the productive value of the land. The difficulty of finance is to a certain extent responsible for the improvement in the purchase outlook. We have steadily get our faces against buying land for tho soldiers at a price which will not give them a chance to make a living with a proper margin, and having regard for the reduction in prices of our principal products in the future. We will not 1l unch out on the basis of recent high prices, and when we have been asked, ay we have often been asked, to pay up Id £l2O an acre lor dairying land, our icplv has been a. sti aight-voi • Ne ’ ”