LAND SETTLEMENT.

Waipawa Mail, Volume LI, Issue 37, 11 December 1929, Page 3

LAND SETTLEMENT.

THREE ADVISORY COMMITTEES. PURCHASE OF PROPERTIES. WELLINGTON, Last night. Much has been done since the passing of the land settlement legislation lasi session to complete the preliminaries, according to a statement on the sul ject issued by the Minister of Lands (lion. G. W. Forbes). The Minister stated at the moment it was intended to advance upon the basis of 90 per cent, of the potential value of improvements intended to he effected by the settler and up to £1250 per man. Such advances would not be made for the purchase of stock. No fee would he charged for inspection unless a loan were granted. Every Commissioner of Crown Lands was at present actively engaged upon an overhaul of the Crown lands in the respective districts. The properties so far offered numbered 800, and the Government had approved of the purchase of 25 properties, costing, say, £391,100, and many more properties were now under consideration. The general setlast twelve months had been satisfactlemcnt of Crown lands during the ton, and had not in any way shown a decrease. CONFIDENCE IN FUTURE. Mr Forbes said that he had the very fullest confidence that the future would show a marked increase in general settlement. He indicated that the Department would have to be most careful in all that it did. Cautiousness on the part of the Department did not appear to meet with approval everywhere, hut he felt that the problem now being handled was one that required the very utmost con sideration, a* the pitfalls were manifest where hasty settlement was at tempted Tlie Minister mentioned that the duties of the Advisory Committees referred to above would involve the combing of all the Crown lands available in the districts mentioned, and that the committees would receive explicit instructions to report definitely as to what areas they considered suitable for settlement, and also as to what particular proportion of such areas should be developed by the Crown before placing settlers thereon. and what proportion could more suitably he utilised by subdividing, roading, and then providing the successful selector with the necessary finance to erect suitable buildings, fencing, and to effect a certain amount of cultivation. He felt it would probably be very advantageous to actually get the men on to Ihe ground and allow them to proceed with their own improvements, but conditions as found by the advisory committees would influence the Development Board in its decisions affecting these questions. Tt would bo unreasonable, he said, to expect any marked increase in the number of selectors of the land immediately. and probably the whole matter would bo swinging very strongly, j say, six months from now. It was proposed in the cases where the men would actually develop the land to put the oversight of development work in the hands of the Agricultural Department, which, of course, had its expert officers, and was in an exceptionally able position to deal with the matter. The appropriate roading of the various blocks would he undertaken out of the. land development fund, and it was intended to utilise unemploved labor in this connection, as he felt that road development should he very actively prosecuted, and, if possible, he ahead of settlement.