CONCLUSION 285 
burden of our National Debt is pressing upon us with 
ever-increasing severity. For the maintenance and 
clearance of this, our resources must be drawn upon 
extensively, and we must ever stand prepared to meet 
the demands of our numerous foreign creditors. Just 
at this point, knowledge of certain economic phenomena 
is a very valuable aid in estimating the attitude, which 
we should now and eventually must assume, with 
reference to our industrial activities. In the light of 
the comparative cost theory, and of the advantages that 
should flow from territorial specialisation of production, 
New Zealand should concentrate attention upon her 
farming industries, and the development of her natural 
resources of coal, iron, gold, and timber. The present 
attitude of a large section of the community, and of our 
politicians, to manufactures must undergo a considerable 
change. Our protective policy has as its objective the 
fostering of many manufacturing industries for which 
this country is not in reality adapted. The gradual 
abolition of this protective policy would benefit the 
community by lowering prices in the protected indus- 
tries, and by turning the fresh supplies of labour and 
capital of the country into more profitable channels. 
The obvious conclusion, then, voiced throughout the 
preceding pages, is that the wheat industry is of great 
importance, and the future will witness progress in this 
industry as in the other great rural industries. 
Although indeed in many places our treatment is 
rather hurried and incomplete, we are nevertheless able 
to offer a foundation for this conclusion. As already 
stated, New Zealand must find annually a large surplus 
of exports to maintain her growing National Debt, which, 
for the most part, is held outside the country. Eivent- 
ually, also, this debt will be repaid and repayment will 
require exportation on an extensive scale. For these 
purposes, the Dominion must rely upon the constant 
