Southland is the southernmost region of New Zealand and its most productive parts are the plains which extend approximately from the Waiau River in the west towards the provincial boundary which in the east reaches the coast near Waikawa. The plains are contained within the limits of Southland and Wallace counties, whereas Lake county is mountainous, including some of the southernmost ranges of the Southern Alps. Strictly, the limits of Southland are confined to the area covered by these three counties; but to complete the account given in the statistical tables Fiord and Stewart Island counties have been included, though they are discussed elsewhere. Invercargill (Urban Area population, 41,088, 1961) is the largest city of the region which had a total population in 1961 of 96,835 (4 per cent of the national population) of which 1.32 per cent were registered as Maoris.
A small-scale land-classification map is the best guide to the economic geography of Southland. The mountainous country, including the Eyre (summit, 6,650 ft) and the Garvie (summit, 6,086 ft) Mountains, is shown as the southernmost extent of the belt of high-country farming, with outliers appearing in the Takitimu Mountains (summit, 5,559 ft) and the Hokonui Hills. Fringing the uplands is an extensive but interrupted swath of undeveloped and partially developed land with marked concentrations in four areas: along the eastern shores of Lakes Manapouri and To Anau — in fact the upper Waiau valley; on the eastern and southern sides of the Takitimus and west of Nightcaps; around the Hokonui Hills, especially the southern side; and a stretch of coastal country east of Invercargill and extending towards the Catlins.
The central portion of Southland contains the developed land where, in three major lowland districts, the most advanced and intensive farming is practised. Enclosed between the high country and the Hokonui Hills, and drained principally by the Waimea and the upper Oreti and Mataura Rivers, are the Five Rivers and Waimea Plains. Extending west from the Mataura River to the Aparima River is the Southland Plain, its eastern portion being known as the Edendale Plain. East of the Longwood Range lies the plain of the lower Waiau.
The plains are composed of alluvial gravels, the Southland Plain being formed by the coalescing fans of the southward-flowing rivers. Silt loams, clay loams, loess soils, and some recent silts constitute the principal soil types and, in the majority of cases, liming and drainage have proved to be indispensable to their productive development. This is in part a response to the leaching caused by high rainfall and to the original deficiencies of the podzolised yellow-brown earths and especially of the moderately acid yellow-grey earths of the Five Rivers and Waimea districts; whilst the low gradient of the plains and the resultant subsoil clay pan formation explains the need for drainage. The climate is responsible for the other principal feature of Southland farming, the provision of adequate winter feed, and the distribution of the rainfall within the region underlies some of the contrasts in the farming systems.
Amongst the principal meteorological stations Invercargill holds a few records – the lowest mean annual temperature, 49.1° F, the lowest annual average of bright sunshine hours, 1,661, and the highest average of rain days, 199. With an annual rainfall of 42.8 in., the effectiveness of precipitation during the summer period is high and pastures do not dry out; but in the winter months the pastures are closed off and winter feeding is undertaken between mid-June and early spring. Frosts are severe in winter; Gore averages 114 per annum and they extend into spring, delaying spring growth. To meet these contingencies root crops and cereals are sown for supplementary feed, very little being sold off the farm. In the 1959–60 season approximately one-eighth (183,199 acres) of the one and a half million acres of cultivated land was cropped for fodder.
The lowest rainfall is experienced in the Five Rivers, Waimea, and Waikaka districts, which are the principal fat-lamb-producing areas. Towards the coast and westwards, rainfall increases, and along the general line of the Mataura, especially between Gore and Mataura and around Wyndham and Edendale, dairying prevails, in association with fat-lamb production. Other dairying areas are concentrated between Invercargill and Wyndham, around Otautau, on the Aparima River, and Tuatapere, on the River Waiau. In the Southland Plain the principal areas of fat-lamb production are the Morton Mains, Woodlands, the Dipton, and the Drummond districts.
But the listing of principal dairying districts has one grave fault of underplaying the very strong trend during the past 20 years towards sheep farming and the tendency of the dairy farms to carry an increasing number of sheep. Perhaps the most unique feature of Southland farming is the farm which contains both a milking and a shearing shed. Since 1921–22 the ratio of cows in milk per hundred sheep shorn for Southland county has fallen from 6.03 to 0.54; the cows in milk numbers have fallen by 58.83 per cent and the regional figure has fallen by 57.06 per cent. Despite the fact that the dairying industry was first established in Southland (with the building of the Edendale cheese factory in 1881), the contribution to national production, both in absolute and in relative terms, has fallen from 3.3 per cent in 1934–38, when 12,753,000 lb of butterfat were processed, to 1.3 per cent in 1959–60, when 6,222,000 lb were processed. Inevitably the export of cheese through Bluff has declined from 13,777 tons in 1930 (a high-point year) to 4,990 tons in 1960. These developments can be regarded only with favour. The decline in production has been associated with greater efficiency per cow and, of greater significance, production has swung away from those commodities whose marketing future appears bleak.
The productivity of Southland's farming is at times astonishing. Admittedly the following statistics refer to one of the most advanced farms and their utility is reduced by the absence of income and expenditure figures. For instance, a 234–acre diversified farm in the Edendale Plain worked by the manager and one permanent labourer carried 35 Friesian milk cows and replacements, 1,050 Romney ewes and replacements, and approximately 15 to 20 Aberdeen Angus for fattening. Butterfat production averaged 400 lb per cow, wool clips 11 lb per sheep, and the lambing percentage was 125. Considering that on the plain the average carrying capacity is about 3.5 ewe equivalents per grassed acre, and that a capacity of five to six ewes is not uncommon, there seems little cause to doubt the projected 24–per-cent increase in sheep numbers during the next two decades. A much higher rate of increase is projected for the partially developed areas (326 per cent), where the number of sheep is likely to increase from 377,900 in 1960 to 1,612,800 by 1980, when, in addition, the at present undeveloped areas should be carrying 932,000 sheep. On the high-country runs sheep numbers are forecast to increase by 27 per cent, from 312,400 to 398,000, a development that will be dependent in part upon the utilisation of better management practices, aerial topdressing and oversowing, and in part upon a large extension of pasture-regeneration methods carried out in field trials at Mid Dome; trials so ecologically oriented that financial considerations have hardly entered the experiments.
Undeveloped land of 150,000 acres, approximately half under partly milled bush, the remainder under tussock, are located in the upper Waiau, the Hokonui district, and the swamp coastal zone of the Seaward Moss, south-west of Invercargill. The partially developed land, 644,500 acres, is located in addition to the foregoing areas in the Birchwood-Nightcaps and the Otaraia-Waiarikiki districts. The State has acquired 220,769 acres for development, which ranks Southland as the second largest land-development area in the Dominion; but the immature stage of the development schemes, markedly contrasting with the situation in the Central Plateau, is revealed by the low figure for alienations, 2,206 acres. The major scheme is located between Lakes Te Anau and Manapouri, where currently 148,000 acres are undergoing development, the aim being to establish 500–acre farms carrying between 1,000 and 1,500 ewes and replacements and including 30 to 40 run cattle: 4,400 acres are being developed also on the Seaward Moss, where some private development, aided by the Marginal Lands Act, is also occurring.
During the past decade the number of sheep shorn increased by 31.44 per cent, a figure close to the national rate of 29.82 per cent, and the number of lambs shorn increased by 303.78 per cent (New Zealand, 66.73 per cent). But the increase in the labour force engaged in manufacturing, 14.75 per cent (1953–61), and of the total labour force, 10.75 per cent, was well below the respective national rates of 21.14 and 18.42 per cent. It is noticeable that between 1911 and 1951 Southland was consistently a region of marked emigration. The high proportion of the population resident in rural areas, 46.29 per cent, and engaged in primary industries 26.17 per cent, suggests the pre-eminently agrarian character of Southland's economy. The existing industries either exploit the natural resources, such as the beech forests or the limestone deposits, or are closely associated with the processing of agricultural products or providing for the needs of the farming community. The structure of Bluff's trade is that of an agricultural district, 65,202 tons of frozen meat, 29,298 tons of wool, being shipped in overseas vessels: 75,518 tons of motor spirit and 59,776 tons of manures were unloaded out of a total inwards traffic of 175,846 tons (1960).
Apart from Invercargill and Bluff, which together account for 39.89 per cent of the regional population, Gore is the only sizable town of the district. One of the striking characteristics of the region's settlement pattern is the prevalence of small marketing centres (population figures for 1961): Winton, 1,473; Tuatapere, 872; Wyndham, 679; Edendale, 607; Lumsden, 666; Makarewa, 465; Riverside, 393; Woodlands, 363; Wallacetown, 319; Mossburn, 273; Tokanui, 227; Balfour, 246; Browns, 273.
In terms of capital investment the biggest industrial scheme upon Southland's economic horizon is the project to produce hydro-electricity from the waters of Lakes Te Anau and Manapouri in order to supply power to the national grid system and to an aluminium-smelting plant located probably near Bluff. Arguing from the basis of cheap and abundant hydro-electricity, the joint State and private venture aims at producing, not before 1971, an initial 100,000 kW of electricity and, at a later but unstated date, 120,000 tons of aluminium, the bauxite being shipped from Queensland. A £150–million project cannot but be impressive and certainly it brings the margins of uninhabited Fiordland into the national economy in a dramatic manner. The impact of the scheme upon Southland's economy ought to be considerable, but its precise effects remain a matter of conjecture, as in fact does the execution of the whole project, because of the world market situation for aluminium.
Southland has important reserves of sub-bituminous coal and lignite and in 1960 produced 364,050 tons, 12.08 per cent of the national output, a proportion which has doubled since 1910. State enterprise prevails in the underground mines, but in the opencast mines private enterprise accounts for the majority of the output. The principal mining areas are concentrated around Ohai, though lignite is worked by the opencast system near Mataura. Most of the production is consumed within the region or in adjacent Otago.
The average annual rate of increase for Southland's population during the next two decades is forecast at 2.5 per cent, a rate well above the national forecast, the growth being concentrated in the Invercargill and Bluff area. This, to say the least, is an optimistic forecast, which to be achieved requires a marked acceleration in economic growth that certainly cannot be produced by an expansion in the pastoral sector alone; it therefore rests upon the less assured prospects of industrial development.
| Urban Population | |||||
| Town | 1911 | 1936 | 1951 | 1961 | 1961 Maoris |
| Queenstown | 696 | 931 | 1,008 | 1,321 | 3 |
| Gore | 3,258 | 4,635 | 5,551 | 7,270 | 45 |
| Mataura | 1,199 | 1,500 | 1,715 | 2,085 | 61 |
| Winton | 564 | 877 | 1,133 | 1,473 | .. |
| Invercargill | 14,170 | 22,494 | 28,074 | 35,605 | 365 |
| Bluff | 1,780 | 2,038 | 2,251 | 3,042 | 159 |
| Riverton | 936 | 908 | 1,018 | 1,225 | 8 |
| Total | 22,603 | 33,383 | 40,745 | 52,021 | 641 |
| Cows in Milk | ||||
| County | Cows in Milk | Dairy Cows in Milk per 100 Sheep Shorn | ||
| 1921–22 | 1951–52 | 1959–60 | 1960 | |
| Lake | 1,016 | 845 | 524 | 0.16 |
| Southalnd | 52,119 | 37,788 | 21,555 | 0.54 |
| Wallace | 13,555 | 10,628 | 6,575 | 0.47 |
| Fiord | .. | .. | .. | .. |
| Stewart Island | 77 | 33 | 15 | 0.61 |
| Total | 66,767 | 49,294 | 28,669 | .. |
| County Population | |||||
| County | 1911 | 1936 | 1951 | 1961 | Maoris 1961 |
| Lake | 2,364 | 2,904 | 1,854 | 2,011 | 3 |
| Southland | 26,460 | 28,243 | 26,545 | 30,619 | 433 |
| Wallace | 9,422 | 11,238 | 10,547 | 11,591 | 119 |
| Fiord | 42 | 19 | 29 | 51 | 6 |
| Stewart Island | 325 | 617 | 576 | 542 | 84 |
| Total county | 38,613 | 43,021 | 39,551 | 44,814 | 645 |
| Total region | 61,216 | 76,404 | 80,296 | 96,835 | 1,286 |
| Land Occupation | ||
| County | Average Area of Holdings 1960 | Area Occupied 1960 |
| acres | acres | |
| Lake | 8,085 | 1,511,914 |
| Southland | 516 | 2,087,429 |
| Wallace | 924 | 1,178,344 |
| Fiord | .. | .. |
| Stewart Island | 345 | 17,926 |
by Samuel Harvey Franklin, B.COM.GEOG., M.A.(BIRMINGHAM), Senior Lecturer, Geography Department, Victoria University of Wellington.