New agricultural land is still being brought into production in this part of the world.
I have just returned from a visit to the West Coast of New Zealand's South Island, where land is now being "broken in" that, in my youth, would have been written off as forever useless:
- semi swamp land, with highly acidic soil and covered mainly in noxious weeds and second growth podocarp forest (known by the Maori word "pakihi.")
To turn this into productive dairy farming land requires a huge investment - firstly in earthworks (a technique known as "humping and hollowing"), then massive and repeated application of fertilizers for up to ten years in a row.
Yet, such is the demand for dairy products - both now and anticipated - that investors are prepared to go to these lengths in order to bring new dairy farming land into production.
Bill.