A Survey of Rural Nelson and Marlborough

New Zealand Journal of Agriculture, Volume 76, Issue 1, 15 January 1948, Page 49

A Survey of Rural Nelson and Marlborough

A REVIEW of population trends and the development of towns and urban centres, and an interpretation of the trade and business of the provinces, are contained in this, the second section of an article . r • , u r c i at i j kj « reporting the results of a survey of rural Nelson and Marlborough by F. R. Bray, who at the time was Field Economist, Rural Development Division, Wellington. The first section, discussing the scope of farming and such secondary industries as exist, the relative importance of farm and factory, and the influence on the people of their methods of livelihood, was published last month, and the concluding portion •ii will appear next month. •

OF the ten counties visited the population declined in seven between 1936 and 1945, the two Census dates, as shown in the following table:

The decrease in county population of the provinces was 3884, but within these counties, though leaving out the larger centres Blenheim, Nelson, and Westport, there are several boroughs, and when those are included in the totals the population decrease is reduced to 3271. Nevertheless, that is a very substantial decrease in nine years. In four of the counties, Buller, Inangahua, Murchison, and Collingwood, coal and gold mining and saw-

milling are important in the population picture, and they are also among the counties which have suffered the most severe population declines. The partial exhaustion of natural resources has involved a drift from those counties which is inevitable, at least

until forest conservation is put on a proper footing. The closing of the coal mine at Puponga, for example, has meant a considerable loss to Collingwood, just as the completion of the rail link with Westport and the closing of Public Works Department camps has meant a loss to Buller. Sounds County is influenced by the tourist trade. Awatere and Waimea are rural counties registering a fall in population, while Marlborough, Kaikoura, and Takaka have increased, though Kaikoura is affected by the completion of the South Island rail connection and Takaka is much affected by the presence of the Golden Bay cement works and the Cobb hydro-electric scheme. In interpreting the reductions shown in Table V the abnormality of both Census years 1936 and 1945 must be considered. The year 1936 was the first

year of final recovery after a prolonged depression. It is more than probable that numbers of workers who had sought employment on farms or gone . gold prospecting because of restricted opportunities elsewhere had not yet left. On the other hand, the effect of the war was still apparent in 1945; the replacement of men who had been absorbed by the war machine meant a combing of rural districts for women workers, involving a two-fold drain on those areas. ’ When the movement in the population of the three towns of Blenheim, Nelson, and Westport is taken into consideration, the net loss suffered by the county and borough areas is just liquidated, as shown in Table VI. Thus for - Nelson and Marlborough as a whole the population between the last two Census dates remained practically stationary. That suggests that it might have increased a little between 1936 and 1945 but for the population drain caused by the war. Location of Decline Do the rural towns and townships show any marked effects of the decline in rural population? Are there numerous cases of unoccupied business premises and houses? In Waimea County the answer is definitely no. The settlements concerned are Wakefield, Brightwater, Mapua, Stoke, Tapa. wera, Upper Moutere, and Riwaka,

Richmond and Motueka being boroughs. In those townships 477 houses were counted and of them, as far as could be judged, there were only two unoccupied houses worthy of the name. In the same towns three shop premises, out of a total of 24, and one blacksmith’s forge were unoccupied. That is not a very high proportion, for in the prosperous borough of Motueka four, shops were unoccupied out of a total of 51. Moreover, the three unoccupied shops were in two towns both now on a suburban bus route to Nelson. The general impression, sustained by such figures as are available, is that the towns of the district have not suffered any marked decline even if they have shown no great progress, except in the case of Stoke, which has 46 of the 72 houses, counted as built after 1928.

The location of rural population decline must be sought elsewhere, 'as employment opportunities in the rural towns do not seem to have declined greatly. In any case, only about one quarter of the total population of the counties visited lives in the rural towns included as such in this survey. The proportion of persons living in towns is high (one half) in Buller, Murchison, and Inangahua, the result of the combined effects of isolation from larger , centres and mining. It is noticeably below average (one fifth and one seventh) in Marlborough and Waimea Counties, which include intensive farming districts and have good access to Blenheim and Nelson. Isolation makes for a larger number of local businesses because of lack of competition from the larger centres. In the other counties the proportions range between these two extremes according to the combined effect of intensity of farming, usually making for a lower proportion in the towns because up to a point farming then becomes relatively more important than other occupations; distance from the provincial centres and ' boroughs, making for a high proportion; and the influence of other occupations, such as mining or sawmilling. Thus Kaikoura, a county tending toward extensive farming but having fair access to Christchurch and

Blenheim, has now a similar proportion in rural towns to Takaka, a dairying district which is extremely isolated.

The assumption that the country areas rather than the small country towns have suffered greatest depopulation is confirmed by the fact that almost without exception it is the sparsely-settled counties in both islands which have shown population decreases.. It seems true to say that the rural areas proper have suffered in comparison with the small townships just as the small towns have suffered in comparison with the larger. The general tendency is toward a concentration of population in the larger centres, which at the moment means to the north.

It is fairly clear that sheep districts have suffered depopulation, as has the area under grain in mixed farming districts.. Some farming districts were short of labour and could not get workers at or near award rates, and with better wages and working conditions in the urban areas, and especially? the 40hour week, that shortage is likely to remain until overtaken by farm mechanisation or any further improvement in the efficiency of the present labour force.

The decline in population in Waimea County calls for further comment. A discrepancy arises from the different dates of the Census, that for 1936 being in March, at the seasonal peak of labour requirements, and that for 1945 in September, before the inflow of labour into the district. That might account for as much as 1500 people, or more than the decrease in population. The 1936 Census totals for Waimea also suggest a very great backing up of people on farms during the depression (2), so that the decline represents to some extent an adjustment because of an improving employment situation.

The decline in rural population

has not had any spectacular effects on rural towns. That can be explained partly in terms of in-

creased farming prosperity, which since 1936 has helped to maintain the economic life of the towns, and partly in terms of mechanisation, improvement in labour utilisation, and some lack of farm maintenance, which have enabled the volume of current farm output to keep up despite a diminished

labour force.

All this is not to deny that important changes have occurred' in the life and occupation of people in these country towns over a period of years. Mechanisation and motor transport have replaced or are replacing the blacksmith by the motor garage, with better transport, the local paper has given way or lost ground to the metropolitan daily (3), and some processing of local resources by grain mills and brickworks has disappeared. But new activities have also come, in addition to motor transport, electrification, .the railway, and the cinema, and contact with the outside world has been made closer.

Locations of Country Towns

A map of the towns included in the survey shows that almost invariably they are on the main through routes, though occasionally new routes have by-passed old settlements, or fertile river flats enclosed by mountains or some other physical obstacle have enticed 1 settlements away from the highway. The township farthest off the arterial route is Tapawera, and even that is on the shortest route between Motueka and the west coast. The main activity of ’ Tapawera is the district high school, situated there because the township is a geographical centre for the district the school serves and it is at the junction of roads going to join the west coast-Nelson route through Motupiko and Tadmor x (the railway runs via Tadmor). In the main the other townships off the main road are the mining settlements of the west coast, attracted to the coal fields. . '

The general location of country towns is determined by the density of settlement and economic resources of the surrounding areas. In continu-ously-settled, extensive sheep country of the small grazing run type 20 to 30 miles may separate one township from the next; in intensive arable farming districts of the market garden and fruit-growing type the distance may be no more , than three or four miles indeed, parts of the Waimea Plains in Nelson are one continuous settlement for miles along the main road, notably the Belgrove-Foxhill-Wake-field area.

Thus from a map showing only roads and townships it should be possible to conclude that the country between Ren wicktown and Murchison, Wakefield and Murchison, and Ward and Kaikoura is barren or only extensively. settled, because it is either mountainous (which in fact it is) or otherwise infertile. The alluvial plains of Waimea and Wairau are represented by the concentration of townships near Nelson and Blenheim. How close townships may be in these circumstances is shown by the presence of three within six miles of Blenheim on the Picton-Blenheim highway and by the borough of Richmond within six miles of Nelson. Those distances may be compared with that of about 50 miles between Ward and Kaikoura in a sheep and run cattle district with but little ploughable land. Between Ward and Kaikoura there is no township worthy of inclusion in this survey but only settlements such as those at Wharanui (a church) and Clarence Bridge (a store). Those differences in accessibility of towns mean substantial variation in household arrangements and patterns of consumption. Distances between centres do not necessarily indicate how towns would be situated with present patterns of production, consumption, and transport, transport having improved so greatly since the days of early settlement. As is obvious when considering population trends, the development of

transport has favoured the larger centres.*. Because of the economic growth of surrounding areas and despite better transport the smaller townships are still able to survive in districts of intensive cropping at distances which may be as little as one and a half to two miles (15 to 20 adjoining houses usually mean a township). The larger rural shopping centres such as Wakefield or Brightwater, which provide some choice of shops and entertainment, can still survive six miles apart, though usually they are more than twice that distance. Though the larger county centres providing professional and administrative services as well as a wide range of shops can in special circumstances be very close together (Richmond and Nelson), in most rural areas this distance is not likely to be less than 20 miles (Picton and Blenheim). Within the limits set by these considerations the location of each town has been decided by the presence of crossroads, water supply, dry flat land, shelter and aspect, or historically by river fords. Those remarks apply to rural towns; mining towns do not necessarily conform to those standards. Development of Towns Towns also have standard patterns of internal development. In the smallest centres the pattern is already determined by the layout of highways and crossroads. The general store,

post office, and hotel will be found on the main highway, tending to concentrate at the crossroads, which are nearly always present. Churches, hall, and school have a greater freedom of movement. They may or may not be on the arterial highway, depending for one thing on the vagaries of public and private land grants. They are probably better off the main road, as they are for the benefit of the local community rather than the through traveller. The houses of the township dwellers will straggle along both the main road and the crossroad from these facilities. On the fringes of the township residential dwellings will be intermingled with farm houses: and small holdings until the land is given over completely’ to . the farming typical of the district (4). From such beginnings most of New Zealand’s smaller country towns have grown. It may be because they have so often grown without any planned development, because they had to use the roads as they found themfor instance, a highway intersected by a crossroad — the unsightly and uneconomical (5) ribbon development

has become such a common feature of the country , districts. Towns ' which, because of their increasing importance later, have been planned _ and roaded often show signs of a more primitive layout, such as old houses appearing among what is now the shopping area, or two or more shopping areas existing, indicating that the economic centre of the town has shifted, perhaps with the advent of the railway or a change in the main traffic route, and in one case at least through the activity of a land’ speculator holding out for a rise in price. As the towns grow in size there is less reliance by shops and hotels on passing traffic and greater diversity of development, isolated shopping areas growing up to serve the local residents.

The most interesting exceptions to the general pattern of layout are Seddonville, Ward, and Ren wicktown. Ren wicktown, which was originally planned as a township—indeed, it was expected by the surveyors to become the capital of Marlboroughdates from 1854. It took its name from its founder, a follower of Edward Gibbon Wakefield, and is reputed to have been setttled on New Zealand Land Company principles. As' a planned township it shows distinctive features-a rectangular layout dotted with church sites and dissected with formed and partly-formed roads. The business area is concentrated along the side of the rectangle formed by the road to Nelson and the older houses and small holdings are for the most part within the rectangle, but more recent development has taken place along the main road. Seddonville and Ward are both, as their names imply, townships originating during the Liberal Ministry of 1891 to 1912 and both depart from usual standards. Seddonville is the outcome of a special settlement of small, holdings, and Ward springs from the well-executed subdivision of large holdings into grazing runs, small holdings of workers’, houses forming part of the township itself. In neither case has - settlement proceeded sufficiently far to upset the - original plan of triangular or rectangular layout.

Picton, a town of much larger pro- ’ portions, is another case where early planning" (and the limitations set by the encircling hills) has prevented a straggling development. In the days when the Provincial Councils performed many of the functions now carried on by the General Assembly Picton was the capital of Marlborough, and planning in reading and the layout of reserves and public buildings anticipated settlement. Picton is laid out with roads converging on a central square, but if it was intended to make this square the centre of gravity of the township, the plans have gone astray, insufficient allowance having been made for the attraction of the harbour and waterfront in this shipping and tourist centre for the Sounds.

The clustering of shops and business premises on the main traffic route, sometimes on the outskirts of a town, clearly indicates the dependence of a town on the surrounding countryside. But as a town grows there comes a time when the local population has sufficient importance to influence . the placing of shops. Therefore in straggling towns the size of Motueka, Reefton, and Kaikoura -.(as also in Picton, though to a less extent because of its compactness) there are the beginnings of shopping areas situated for the convenience of local residents and well away from > the shopping centres. Before that stage is reached a . more elaborate reading system than the highway and side road of the small township is required, and as a town graduates into the shopping, centre categorythat is one that has competing shopsresidential roads ' make their appearance, suburbs in embryo. Usually, however, these roads are in addition to a ribbon development along the highways and not substitutes for it. This ribbon development tends to result not only in lessened public convenience, by increasing the distances between local residences and shops, but also in higher shopping overheads by creating a demand for additional shopping facilities;, which the town might be able to do without if it were more compact (6). »

To obtain a layout which will

serve the local community as well as the surrounding countryside and through traffic is a complicated problem. The by-passing of country towns by arterial highways, though it will certainly reduce traffic risks to local inhabitants and free the town from dependence on this incidental trade, will also mean some economic loss and a further weakening of the position of the country town, at

least in the short run.

To the observer the absence of attempts in the smaller towns to weave the life of the community around any one centre combining cultural and recreational facilities is noteworthy and perhaps significant significant because it may indicate that, with the distractions offered by books, magazines, outside daily papers, films, and the radio, residents no longer look to the local town or village as offering the facilities of the complete life. Perhaps this shifting of the centre of attention has gone too far. -'Z '

Very few attempts to beautify country towns were noticed, and shade trees, lawns, or gardens on roads or reserves are noticeably absent. Lack of shelter from prevailing winds is

another feature. There seems to be a case for local planning and initiative in this respect.

The following may be of interest as comments made on the spot about a fairly-typical though somewhat better-than-average rural town with a population of between 300 and 350: “The main road is tar sealed; the shopping area boasts in addition a footpath on one side of the road. Other streets are metalled and dusty with no footpaths or kerbs and with long grass and weeds on the roadsides. There are no shade trees, lawns, or gardens on roadsides, though there is a good deal of indiscriminate planting of the inevitable pines and gums on surrounding reserves. Such plantations were being threatened in three separate cases by fires burning in the vicinity. For the greater part of the town gardens are unspectacular, somewhat untidy, and weedy (specially lawns). That applies particularly to the older places in the more central part of the town, where sections are too small for extensive planting of either shelter or ornamental shrubs. These remarks do not apply to some of the newer homes with more extensive sections. Apart from anything else, the varying nature and condition of frontages—paling fences, wire fences, hedges in varying stages of tidiness, and concrete fences, all of different shapes and sizes—make for a picture of sturdily-inde-pendent untidiness.”

Types of Country Towns

At first when casually passing through ’ the country one might. be tempted to imagine that towns just happen, that they always have been where they are and always will be. That this is far from true is obvious in areas of New Zealand where gold mining or timber milling were early activities on land that was too mountainpus, infertile, or remote for the later development of pastoral or agricultural pursuits. Towns have an intimate and complex relation with the surrounding countryside and with other towns of varying size, both near and far.

The significance of the smallest kind of rural township lies in its ability to distribute through general store, petrol pump, insurance agency, hotel, and post office a wide range of goods and services at short notice and provide rapid communication with the outside world. In most cases it should be sufficiently close to the people it serves for them to make day-to-day contacts or visits. It will not usually have a bakehouse or butchery, products from which are usually delivered from a larger centre. In addition to a general store, hotel, post office, and railway station, the typical town of this type

would have one or more churches, hall, and school, and in centres closely settled or using much machinery a motor repair garage or blacksmith. The school is important not only because it provides educational facilities but because, except in the case of a consolidated school, the radius from which the children come will provide a fairly-clear indication of the extent of the area served by the township, and children can be entrusted with posting mail and bringing home requirements. Similarly, the limits to the area served by the local church or hall are set by the possibilities of convenient travel and return. By having clergymen divide their attention among several settlements it is possible to have at least one place of worship in almost every township.

The factor determining the area which the town and church serve is transportits speed, cost, and comfort. In most cases both the location of the town and the presence of a church will have been determined by transport conditions in the past, when motive power was the horse and roads displayed marked deviations in surface as well as in direction. Nevertheless, the active , functioning of church or local hall indicates the continued presence of some feeling of community centred round the township. In dairying districts the local co-operative dairy factory, daily taking in the whole milk or sending out cream trucks to suppliers, helps toward the same end by bringing suppliers together and emphasising their common interest in the development of the district, in increasing the number of suppliers, in the efficiency of management of the factory, and in the receipt of adequate returns. Some dairy companies run co-operative stores.

The second type of rural town is larger, serves a wider area, and has services which the smaller country town is not capable of providing. To reach their customers the shopkeepers of this town will be obliged to deliver perhaps once or twice a week, especially commodities such as meat and bread. In typical country districts the distances to be covered will be too great for regular or casual trips into town by the more distant customers. In this type of town the turnover of groceries and drapery will be larger and the range carried wider, partly because there are more local residents and partly because the presence of a cinema and a wider range of shopping facilities will bring the more remote people on picture night and the weekly late shopping night (7). Thus the sell-

ing of drapery and footwear may be taken over by a special shop competing against the one or two general stores selling drapery as a sideline, and these in turn may be competing with a shop selling only groceries and hardware. The larger or more remote of this type of township will have in addition police station, boot repairer, fruiterer and confectioner, tea rooms, hairdresser and tobacconist, often a transport depot, and sometimes saleyards, a maternity hospital, and a library. This type of township can provide entertainment facilities and cater for those spending a day in shopping —tea rooms and a choice between shops, so that there is some rather primitive scope for comparing prices, qualities, and service. Wakefield, Nelson, is a good example of this type of town. Wakefield also has a builder’s workshop, timberyard, radio repairer, and banking agency.

Finally, there is the largest type of country centre, which provides shopping facilities in a more refined form over a still wider range of commodity and service. ' This implies more than one shop of the same type as well as shops of different types offering a varying range of commodities or degrees of service and competing in the same line of tradefor example, more than one draper’s shop, or departmental store, draper, mercer, and tailor selling similar items of clothing. A general store in a town of this size would be something of a relic, though they are sometimes found, especially where there is a large moving population, as in Picton. These are the centres to which shoppers go to make some of their more important and less frequent purchases of clothing, household' furnishings, building materials, books and music, chemical, electrical, and farm supplies, and personal and professional services. * As well as firms handling farm produce and requirements in bulk, doctors, chemists, dentists, hospitals, lawyers, accountants, land and estate agents, and sometimes State Departments are to be. found. Such a town will be the venue of agricultural and pastoral shows and may have a racecourse. These towns are administrative and professional centres for their districts.

Urban Centres

The country towns do not, of course, provide a complete coverage for all the many requirements of the consumer’s budget. In the field of highclass entertainment and sport, and in higher learning particularly,; the country town cannot compete with the

main provincial centres and cities. That applies with few exceptions in all fields where the highest class of skill is required, professional or artistic. Whenever the highest quality in printing, publishing, advertising, or dress is required, or when durable goods such as refrigerators, watches, furniture, jewellery, machines, and tools and the more specialised types of books, music, musical instruments, flowers, or shrubs are sought, a journey to or communication with one of the main centres is indicated. The stocking of such items by country shops would involve a great deal of dead stock. The provision of such specialised services as those of laundries, dyeing and dry cleaning works, herbalists, musicians, schools of dressmaking, surveyors, specialist surgeons, chiropodists,. plasterers, or signwriters is 1 impossible in country districts. Board and business meetings, holiday travel, races, and sporting eventsall these activities attract, and farmers or their wives take the opportunity presented by any such perhaps infrequent visits to urban centres to have the family group- taken, to buy new cur-, tains or carpets, washing machines, or ornamental china.

A further distinguishing feature of the three urban centres of the two provinces Nelson, Blenheim, and Westport—is the development of commercial organisations. There are transport and shipping companies, warehouses, merchants, agents, and bulk distributors of, for example, petrol. In the administrative field are numerous Government Departments, including those of Air, Army, Customs, Health, Lands and Survey, Public Works, and Social Security, in addition to the ever-present railway and post office. Industries include cordial factories, breweries, engineering ' shops and foundries, building contractors, and cabinetmakers. Local authority activities include gasworks and abattoirs, and in addition professions such as those of architect and undertaker divorced from builder or cabinetmaker. There are business, professional, and worker associations.

Westport differs from Nelson and Blenheim in that, while they are primarily farming centres, the business of Westport mainly depends on the extractive industriesmining and timber milling. Consequently Nelson and Blenheim are characterised by the presence of nurseries, florists, seed and produce merchants, flour millers, and other processors- of primary produce and numerous stock and station agents absent in Westport. Altogether they show a more intricate pattern of economic development. In Blenheim and Nelson are many financial institutions, land and commission agents, and insurance offices, all designed to deal with the business affairs of the numerous farmers.

Nelson is much the largest of the three towns and is a popular place in which to- retire. It is also a shipping port of some importance. There are shipping engineers, engineers’ merchants, , foundries, electrical welding establishments, and industries engaged in , working, in textiles and clothing, building materials, furnishings, and major motor repairs. Stock and share broking and auctioneering are natural additions to the range of financial institutions in a community with many aged people of independent means. Additional Government Departments, such as those of Employment, Broadcasting, and Education, are present.

It follows that, except in farm-

ing, the most highly-paid positions are in the cities, so that costs of living are highest there also. It is in the cities that the most specialised types of skill are required, as well as the highest executive positions and the largest branches of firms, for their information, communication, and ancillary services are most highly developed. There also the bulk of primary produce is collected for export overseas and imports and local manufactures are distributed to other parts of New Zealand. It is no accident that the main provincial and urban centres are on or near harbours. These cities are characterised by the presence of a large army of wholesalers notably absent in the purely country centres except for

their travelling representatives.

The four or five types of towns form a highly-intricate network, each competing to some extent with the others but justifying its existence by serving a different purpose on the whole. For a rough distinction the towns might be differentiated by calling the smallest the “daily” town and the next the “weekly” town (but to local residents the daily town also); then.the district centre would become the “monthly” town and the urban centre the “yearly” town or city.

Shops and Businesses

The keys to an understanding of the structure of towns are knowledge of the proportion of consumers’ budgets which is spent on different commodities and services and of difficulties involved in transport. As towns increase in size they add businesses which cater for less and less important and less-frequently-bought items in the consumers’ and producers’ budgets. Items such as groceries or clothing, which bulk large and are bought frequently, are provided in the smallest country towns. Items which are bought frequently but which have to be treated separately, such as meat and bread, and which do not absorb nearly as large a proportion of household . expenditure, are not usually sold or prepared by

special shops in the smallest country towns but are distributed from larger centres. So it goes on until the minor items, especially those bought infrequently, such as medical services or music, are provided only in the larger towns. Durable items or those bought in bulk and therefore infrequently, such as motor-cars, even if quite important .. in the budget, can also be bought only in the larger centres.

From a tabulation of the proportion of shops of different kinds useful information can be obtained about the importance and frequency of purchase of various items in household expenditure. Such a tabulation for the country areas of the two provinces gives the following results:

(a) Mainly food and drink: 105. (b) Footwear and clothing: 39. (c) Household requirements: 19. (d) Stationers and newsagents: 11. (e) Personal services: 15. (f) 'Chemists, druggists, photographic services: 8.

(g) Professional: 27. , (h) Departmental stores, general ~ stores, stock and station agents: 40. (i) Businesses connected with communications and personal transport (garages, taxis, radio and cycle dealers):.7o. (j) Banks, business . and administrative offices: 22.

(k) Tradesmen (plumbers, blacksmiths, engineers, etc.): 26.

(1) Hotels, accommodation houses: 53. ( m ) p os t offices: 34,.. Theatres” 14 ... m , Transport depots, carriers, wood coa merchants. 30. (p) Miscellaneous (jewellers, watch repairs, sports goods, florists, etc.): 8. In addition there were 4 billiard saloons, 21 railway stations, and 9 hospitals. Apart from business

premises there were 24 lodges, Red Cross and Plunket centres, as well as schools, libraries, churches, halls, and other public buildings. From other data collected (8) it is reasonable to assume that the totals give a good impression of the distribution of household expenditure as

between items a, b, and c. In comparison businesses of types d, e, and i are high in numbers, but stationery shops usually carry other miscellaneous lines, so that stationery and readying material represent , only part of what they sell. Similarly many shops of type e . are hairdressers who rely on sales of tobacco' and toilet goods

for a substantial part of their income. The large numbers under i suggest the importance of tourist traffic in the two provinces, as well as the dependence of many of the important districts included on road rather than rail transport. According to the present state of knowledge, a gradually-rising proportion . of' businesses providing

professional and other services, transport, and accommodation may be expected, with other increases, perhaps under the headings of household requirements, reading matter, and almost certainly miscellaneous items • What prevents , all the peoples needs being met from the one centre is the r cos? o? transportt/tin" both time and money. The small country town can compete with the larger country town, despite possibly higher overheads and inferior range and service, because it is not usual to devote the best part of a morning or afternoon or spend more than a few pence on travelling for daily needs. These costs of trans- . port limit the area served by any town. < Thus two distinct influences affect the future of the country town. Rising standards of living and increasing efficiency .of transport both tend to favour the large centre rather than the small, at least in the short run.. Better livmg standards tend to increase ex- • penditure on items such as luxury goods and especially services offered by the larger centres and on the number of visits to them, while increasing efficiency of transport tends to widen the area which the larger towns serve. The advent of the Nelson-Wakefield bus service and its effect on the life

of such towns as Stoke and Richmond is particularly noticeable. In the long run rising living standards may attract new businesses into country districts, but even then they may be losing ground compared with larger centres. , Economic Development j n the light of that knowledge the understanding and interpreting of the economic development of the counties visited becomes easier. Attention. is concentrated on shops; offices are confined to the larger country towns, warehouses other than bulk stores for primary produce are in the urban centres, and hotels are affected by the vagaries of the licensing position. Excluding Sounds County, which is not an economic unit with developed townships and which shows features peculiar to itself, it was found that with one exception there .was a shop to every 100 to 150 people in each of the counties visited. The exception wa s Awatere County, where there was one shop to about 300 people, which illustrates how residents of sparselysettled sheep country have to be selfreliant in food, relying on bulk purchase of commodities and very occasional journeys many miles to town. 1 Of the other counties, Kaikoura, Inangahua, Murchison, Takaka, and

Collingwood (the last two taken together being an economic unit with a complete range of country towns) form one g rou p w ith a shop to every 100 inhabitant ; That may seem a high tion . but the ir remoteness from ; 1 • +1 large centres 1S P artly responsible, These counties have to provide internally facilities which in counties such as Buller, Waimea, and .Marlborough are readily accessible in .Westport, Nelson, and Blenheim. It might seem that shop buildings, shop attendants, stock, and often truck are a heavy load to tie carried on the average trade represented by 100 people or about 20 families. In comparison with more populous and densely-settled, areas that is so ai ? d because, other th mgs being " a J’ nn! ? bUvitr average P etl £ ve co “ d 1 4 ’ JJlrv tn cnvfr ™ a S b en<S! ronrZpntpd bv nw _i.pL , , <j+nrk transport costs Reward ’even ff lessts swallowed un in ent Other things ~ not nfcourse be equal if as in picton there was a large tourist traffic, ’ It follows that under such conditions country areas would have to pay not only for extra transport charges to and from the shop but also because of a higher proportion of shops per head of population, resulting from a lower density of settlement. Under

monopolistic influences and price fixing the price difference between town and country may not be so noticeable, the costs then being spread over the community.

Apparently, if the number of families within the radius which shops can serve falls below a critical level, represented in these districts by an average of about 20 families to a shop, either the mark-up would have to be so high that sales would not justify establishment, or under price control trade would not yield an adequate return for labour and capital invested. Country areas may therefore either have to do without certain services altogether—for example laundries, dry cleaning, and cake shops—or obtain them at greater cost.

The other bracket of counties, Waimea, Buller, and Marlborough, has about 150 people to each shop. The townships in these populous counties markedly show the effect of proximity to the. main centres included within their, boundaries. The most extreme examples of that effect are Stoke, Grovetown, and Waimangaroa, near Nelson, Blenheim, and Westport respectively. . Rapidly-developing Stoke, with about 130 occupied houses and a population .of * about 600, has as yet only two shops (one quite . new) Grovetown, about one-third the size, has none at all; and Waimangaroa, with about 50 houses, has only one. In those cases, if all shopping is not done in the main centres, then only the daily needs are bought in the local township and the more ’ elaborate and less routine purchases made in the provincial or urban centre. Though Murchison’s population is slightly fewer than Stoke’s, it has 11 shops; the population of Murchison County is only two-thirds as great again as that of Stoke by itself. ~ Richmond, with 175 houses and 13 shops, is in an intensive farming district; Kaikoura has 210 houses and 33 shops, though, of course, it serves an extensive hinterland.

For a, further comparison of both shops , and offices, Granity and Takaka offer a splendid contrast. Granity is 22 miles along the flat from Westport, Takaka 80 miles from Nelson, 40 miles from Motueka, and separated from them by a formidable hill. The only weakness is that Granity is centred in a mining district with only a little

dairying, and Takaka in a dairying district supplemented by a large cement works and hydro-electric scheme: —

The differences are, as would be expected, most striking in professional services and other business groups, Takaka has a dentist, two doctors, an accountant, solicitor’s offices, a plumber and tinsmith, milk bar, beauty salon, chemist, two men’s outfitters, engineer’s workshop, hospital, and tea rooms. The important point revealed is that the difference lies not so much in the number of shops of the same type, as densities of settlement are

much the same, but rather in the diversification of types: At the time of the visit Wakefield (nearly 20 miles ; from Nelson) and Brightwater (14 miles from Nelson) each had a motor , garage, a hotel, two shops of the ; general store-grocer type, a baker and - pastrycook, and a cycle or radio repair dealer; but Wakefield had in

addition a butcher, confectioner, two

hairdressers and tobacconists, tea rooms, builder, timberyard, blacksmith’s forge, theatre, and banking

agency. Both have the same population situated in farming districts equally intensively settled. Other interesting variations are also shown from town to town. Picton, for example, with a number of tea rooms, a souvenir shop, launch offices, several hotels and accommodation houses, and shops specially featuring camping requisites, shows its dependence on the tourist traffic. Reefton, with 12 out of 39 shops unoccupied, has had a markedly-different recent history from Kaikoura, with only two out of 35 shop premises unoccupied. Farming activ-

ities of the district also have an influence: Retail butchers’ shops are not expected in districts given over to pastoral farming, while in the prosperous town of Motueka are a bookseller and printer, a sports goods store, electrical and radio dealers, watch and cycle repairers, cake shop, a wine and spirit merchant, a tailor, and dealers in furniture, leather goods, hardware, and crockery—quite an impressive list of near-luxury items.

The destination of the farm produce s important, too. For example, extensive pastoral farmers w ho truck their wool direct to the larger centres are -independent of the smaller country towns in a way that dairy farmers who send their milk or butterfat to the local factory are not.

(2) From 1926 to 1936 the population of Waimea County increased from 9172 to 12,506 and of Marlborough County from 7381 to 7518.

(3) The extent of the economic orbits of Christchurch and Wellington can be judged by the circulation 'of the newspapers of the two cities. Christchurch papers go to within 20 or 30 miles south of Blenheim and over to the west coast. Wellington papers circulate side by side with local papers in the BlenheimNelson hinterlands.

(4) The towns are too small in all cases and the country surroundings too varied for them to be surrounded by belts of market gardens and milk suppliers, as envisaged by V. Thunen in “The Stationary State.” (5) Uneconomical for availability of services, but other factors, such as cheaper land or the layout of roads for the convenience of through traffic, have determined the development.

. (6) Cf. the effect of density of settlement on shops per head of population in the different counties, pages 56 and 57.

(7) A distinction might be made between the purely delivery centre (the first type of town-

ship with the addition of butcher and baker and perhaps another general store) and the shopping centre to which people come to shop from outlying districts which have their own small, general-store type of township.

(8) Cf. Doig, “A Survey of the Standards of Life of New Zealand Dairy Farmers,” page 88.

County 1936 1945 Increase Decrease Sounds 1,073 946 127 Awatere 1,607 1,443 164 Waimea 12,934 11,497 1,437 Collingwood 1,517 ' 975 -- Z 542 542 ’ Buller 6,350 4,936 1,414 Murchison 1,919 1,270 649 . Inangahua 3,891 3,242 ’ ■ 649 Marlborough 7,787 7,856 69 Kaikoura 2,578 3,424 846 Takaka 1,999 2,182 183 TOTALS . . 41,655 37,771 1,098 4,982

TABLE V: COUNTY POPULATION

Provincial or Urban Centres: 1936 1945 Increase Decrease Blenheim .. .. 5,036 5,780 744 Nelson (including Takaka) 12,076 14,176 2,100 Westport .. . . . . . . • 4,241 : 4,686 445 3,289 Other Boroughs: 3,289 Picton .. 1,381 1,577 196 Richmond .. .. .. ‘ 1,381 1,577 196 1,138 1,387 249 Motueka 1,741 1,909 168 i 3,902 County areas .. . . 3,884 Net gain for nelson and Marl- — borough Provinces .. .. 3,902 3,884 ' 18

TABLE VI: PROVINCIAL POPULATION

Takaka Granity Draper .. : . .. 1 2 General store , . . 1 Grocer .. . ../ y. 1 .■■■ . Baker .. .. .. i Butcher .. .. .. i 1 District high school .. i 1 Departmental store ■ . . 4 3 Stationer .. .. ’ . . 1 Boot repairer . . . . 1 Motor garage . . ... 2 2 Theatre .. ■ '■ . . ‘1 1 Hairdresser . . . . 1 1 Cycle repairer . . . . 1 1 Professional offices . . 7 ' 2 Other . . 8 2 31 17