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Graphic: An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand 1966.

Warning

This information was published in 1966 in An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock. It has not been corrected and will not be updated.

Up-to-date information can be found elsewhere in Te Ara.

IMMIGRATION

Contents


Principal Migration Movements

Diag. 1 shows the year-by-year changes in net migration (i.e., arrivals less departures) and natural increase (excess of births over deaths) from 1840 to 1963. The principal movements were as follows:

  1. From 1840 to 1860 natural increase was small and immigration the principal means of population increase. New Zealand's first recession in the middle forties temporarily reduced the intake. (Statistical evidence in the earlier years is incomplete, but there is sufficient information to estimate the figures in missing years fairly satisfactorily. From 1855 a continuous statistical series is available.)

  2. The discovery of gold at Otago in 1861 brought a large number of new settlers. The sixties saw 204,786 arrivals, the peak year being 1863 with 45,730 – a figure not reached again until 1949. Most of these immigrants went to the South Island, principally Otago. As was inevitable, many found neither Utopia nor El Dorado and left New Zealand in disillusionment. The boom was shortlived and by the end of the decade the country was in a depression.

  3. The high peak in the seventies resulted largely from the excessively vigorous scheme of assisted immigration launched by the Vogel administration as part of its expansionist policies. The result was an increase in European population of a magnitude not exceeded till after the Second World War. The year 1874 was noteworthy for the arrival of 43,965 immigrants, of whom 32,118 were Government assisted. The net migration gain for the year of 38,106 is the highest New Zealand has experienced and was followed by 25,270 the next year.

  4. The main stimulus to immigration from the early eighties was the development of refrigerated shipping which enabled New Zealand to expand greatly the marketing of its farm products overseas, thus creating a demand for farmers and farm labourers. The late eighties and early nineties, however, were affected by a serious trade recession, the result of which is shown in table 1 as a net outflow. In the five years to 1891, 11,900 more persons departed than arrived to take up residence.

  5. Except for a net intake of 10,412 in 1893, of which 8,074 came from Australia, the nineties saw little growth from immigration. This was due principally to the 194,004 arrivals being well balanced by a high level of departures in this decade.

  6. A new wave of immigration, which was fairly well sustained, occurred from 1901 to 1914. A sharp trade recession in Australia between 1900 and 1905 was an important influence, and this was followed by the reintroduction of Government-sponsored immigration. The First World War brought immigration almost to a standstill.

  7. Renewed interest by the Government after the war fostered immigration from 1919 to 1926, although the recession of 1922 to 1923 caused a temporary drop. In the later years of the twenties, immigration tailed-off as Government schemes were cut back.

  8. The depression of the thirties caused departures to exceed arrivals by 9,918 from 1931 to 1935. Little was done in the recovery period to encourage immigration, but each year the net migration gain increased: from 1936 to 1940 it totalled more than 12,000. In the Second World War it became a trickle apart from the arrival in 1940–41 of 566 evacuees from Britain, and in 1944 of 837 Polish refugees. For nearly 20 years prior to the end of the war, immigration was at a low level.

  9. The pent-up demand for capital and consumer goods and the need to catch up on delayed national development resulted in acute labour shortages after the war, and in an effort to meet these needs the Government introduced new immigration schemes designed to select and assist immigrants to New Zealand. The demand for labour here coincided with the desire of many people to emigrate from Britain and Europe, and as a result the Government schemes and independent immigration together provided a net migration increase of 185,127 from 1946 to 1963.

This short historical survey is summarised as follows:

Table 1: Immigration, Emigration, and Excess of Arrivals Over Departures – 1860 to 1863
Period Arrivals Departures Excess Arrivals Over Departures
1860–64 132,225 45,301 86,924
1865–69 62,561 33 493 29,268
1870–74 87,469 27,216 60,253
1875–79 103,358 30,532 72,826
1880–84 75 023 43,337 31,686
1885–89 74,987 77,403 — 2,416*
1890–94 98,953 86,310 12,643
1895–99 95,051 85,349 9,702
1900–04 136,968 98,993 37,975
1905–09 191,646 144,786 46,860
1910–14 204,052 168,158 35,894
1915-19 95,836 89,045 6,791
1920–24 197,480 150,133 47,347
1925–29 196,124 165,923 30,201
1930–34 112,730 118,999 — 6,269*
1935–39 173,913 163,926 9,987
1940–44 38,617 34,634 3,983
1945–49 144,269 123,550 20,719
1950–54 303,588 236,206 67,382
1955–59 388,727 337,146 51,581
1960–64 704,110 647,266 56,844
1860 to 1964 Total net gain   710,181

*Excess of Departures. Note: The figures here (and elsewhere in this article) are exclusive of crews, through passengers, tourists on cruising liners, and of movements of the armed forces, 1914–19 and 1939–63. In the earlier years most arrivals were settlers. In more recent years the figures for arrivals are heavily influenced by visitors and other people taking up temporary residence. However, the difference between arrivals and departures so calculated gives in the final column a reliable statement throughout the period of the net results of migration movements. (

Statistical Report on Population and Buildings for the Year 1935–36 and subsequent reports.)