LEADING FEATURES OF THE WHEAT INDUSTRY 189 



acres. Both provinces present varying types of land 

 from rich fertile plains to rugged mountainous country. 

 The land of Canterbury is divisible into three main 

 classes arable, pastoral, and waste lands. The arable 

 land is composed of the Canterbury Plains and the 

 Downs of South Canterbury, comprising an area of 

 about 2J million acres. Of the remaining land, some 7 

 million acres, about 5 million acres are suitable for 

 pastoral farming, while the rest, highly mountainous 

 country, riverbeds, lakes, and forests, is unfitted for 

 occupation. 



In Otago, a smaller proportion of land is available for 

 wheat growing, for here no great plain is found within 

 the wheat area, which is confined to the northern portion 

 of the province and contains an area suitable for wheat 

 production of, probably, not more than 500,000 acres. 



The nature and character of this land have already 

 been considered in Chapter III., but the whole area is 

 admirably suited for the production of wheat, and the 

 possibilities of New Zealand as a producer of wheat can 

 be more readily comprehended when this fact is realised. 

 Of the area of 3,000,000 acres suitable for the growth 

 of the cereal, and this is a conservative estimate, 750,000 

 acres could be devoted to wheat growing annually. If 

 we, then, make the supposition that the yield per acre 

 on account of the extension of the margin would be 

 reduced to, say, 25 bushels, New Zealand would then 

 produce 18,750,000 bushels each year. This could be 

 done, moreover, without any great disturbance in the 

 present state of rural occupation, were sufficient supplies 

 of capital and labour available. This consideration, in 

 view of the desired increase in primary production on 

 account of the War, opens up an interesting line of 

 investigation which is not strictly relevant to present 



