At the turn of the twentieth century, New Zealand was one of the wealthiest nations in the world on a per capita basis. We examine the role of innovation in explaining New Zealand’s economic performance. Using a new dataset on patent applications for the period 1880-1895, we consider whether the geographical concentration of innovative activity influenced economic activity. We find relationships between agricultural and pastoral output indices and inventiveness and between different regions and related industries. The results, however, are relatively weak. We conclude that tests of agglomeration effects in New Zealand during this period deserve further attention.

中文翻译：

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初级产业中的发明地理：新西兰的一些初步结果，1880-1895

在 20 世纪初，按人均计算，新西兰是世界上最富有的国家之一。我们研究了创新在解释新西兰经济表现方面的作用。使用 1880-1895 年期间专利申请的新数据集，我们考虑创新活动的地理集中是否影响经济活动。我们发现了农牧业产出指数与创造性之间以及不同地区和相关产业之间的关系。然而，结果相对较弱。我们得出的结论是，这一时期新西兰的集聚效应测试值得进一步关注。