There are several precious cultural relics in the China Customs Museum. They travel through the war smoke of the times and take us into the development process of taxation in the Republic. They take us to listen to historical narratives and pursue the red memory. Cultural relics

There are several precious cultural relics in China Customs Museum

They travel through the smoke of the times

Take me with them Let's walk into the development of taxation in the Republic

Take us to listen to the historical narrative

Pursue the red memory

Cultural relics display

One-yuan silver coupons issued by the Soviet Bank of Northwest Anhui Special Economic Zone

Cultural relics display 2

Copper coins of the Soviet area in western Hunan and Hubei

Cultural relics display 3

New China's first tariff code

01 The earliest customs in the Soviet area: Ship Inspection Office

In 1928, the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army established a base in Jinggangshan and established the Soviet Central Government. The Soviet central government believed that after the base areas were stabilized, in order to break the economic blockade and ease the tension in material supply, the central finance could not rely entirely on crackdowns on local tyrants and fines, but should use taxation to solve the problem.

The former site of the Provisional Central Government of the Soviet Republic of China in Ruijin, Jiangxi

In 1930, the democratic government of workers and peasants in northeastern Jiangxi established foreign trade offices and ship inspection offices in each county to manage trade between the Soviet area and non-Soviet areas. The Ship Inspection Office is a ship supervision and tax collection agency. In a certain sense, it is the earliest customs under the leadership of the Communist Party of China. The tax rate in the Soviet area is very low, and no tax is paid on grain transactions. The daily tax revenue of the ship inspection office is about 3,000 yuan.

02 The establishment of customs offices in the Soviet areas

In 1931, the Soviet governments of each county established customs offices on their own to solve financial difficulties. According to statistics, at that time, 17 customs offices were established in 11 counties in Jiangxi and 7 customs offices were established in 4 counties in Fujian, which were managed by the Tariff Collection Section of the State Administration of Taxation of the Ministry of Finance. In February 1933, the Central Soviet Area Government decided to "establish border customs" and reviewed and approved the "Tariff Regulations" and "Tariff Collection Detailed Rules", unifying the tax system and achieving tariff autonomy in some areas.

The first "Duty Collection Rules" of the Soviet Area

The number of personnel in each customs office is determined according to the business situation. Generally, there are 2-3 inspectors, and 2 each for accounting, accounting, cashier, management, investigation and statistics, cooks, and porters. The director of the Customs Department is selected by the Presidium of the County Soviet and reported to the Ministry of Finance of the Soviet District Government for appointment.

The customs office is located at the border with the Kuomintang-controlled area. It is generally located at a difficult terrain, convenient waterway shipping, and land transportation pass. Because it is often attacked by the Kuomintang troops and local armed forces, the customs office is equipped with armed forces. The customs office near the white area is equipped with one or two platoons of troops; the customs office in a relatively safe area is equipped with one or two squads of troops.

For all incoming and outgoing ships, the customs office will send people on board for inspection. After the inspection, the inspector fills out an inspection form. The accountant calculates the tax based on the inspection form. The accountant then issues a tax payment slip and gives it to the cashier. After receiving the tax, the cashier then pays the tax slip. people.

After the goods are taxed, the customs office sends people to mark a large character on a wooden board on the ship as a secret code that the tax has been paid. The big characters change every day. If they are different or missing, Red Army will know that the merchant ship is sneaking through customs and fire a warning shot.

The tax rate for goods shipped out of the Soviet Area is 3%-5%, with a maximum of no more than 10%. For goods shipped into the base area, foreign goods are taxed at 5%-10%, cosmetics are taxed at 50%, superstitious products are taxed at 100%, and daily necessities such as salt, paper, electrical appliances, and medicines are tax-free.

03 The significance of the establishment of the Soviet Area Customs Office

According to statistics, at that time, the large customs office collected 30,000 yuan in taxes a month, and the small one collected 3,000 yuan, and the taxes were handed over directly to the Ministry of Finance. This large amount of tax has played an important role in solving the central government's financial difficulties.

The Customs Office of the Central Soviet Area only existed for three years. After the Red Army's Long March, it was canceled on its own.In general, the Soviet area customs agencies' management of entry and exit affairs has a strong military flavor, which is inseparable from the fact that their work is first to obey the needs of the revolutionary war, and secondly to the economic requirements.

04 New China's first tariff code

In the early days of the founding of New China, customs in various places were in a decentralized state, with no tariff code and ununiformed tax rates. The formulation of the national tariff code of the People's Republic of China began to be put on the agenda. In view of the great significance of formulating tariffs involving all aspects of the national economy, the General Administration of Customs requested the Government Administration Council to coordinate with other economic management departments to form a tariff committee.

In January 1950, the Government Affairs Council approved the establishment of a Tariff Commission under the leadership of the Central Financial and Economic Commission. Yao Yilin was the chairman, Ding Guitang was the deputy chairman, and the members were from the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Heavy Industry and other economic management departments. The Tariff Commission has an office located at the General Administration of Customs.

The Tariff Commission carries out its work in accordance with the basic principles stipulated in the "Decision of the Central People's Government Administration Council on Tariff Policy and Customs Work". The basic principles are:

Basic principles

The customs tariffs established this time were based on the traditional import and export commodities at that time, and were formulated with reference to the tariff classification catalog of the League of Nations and the commodity classification method of the Soviet tariffs. According to the different natural attributes, uses and processing levels of goods, they are divided into 17 categories, 89 groups, and 939 tax numbers, with a total of more than 1,700 tax items.

On October 24, 1950, the Tariff Commission Office submitted the draft tariff code to the Government Affairs Council. On May 4, 1951, the Government Affairs Council promulgated the "Customs Import and Export Tariffs of the People's Republic of China" and its implementation regulations, which came into effect on the 16th of that month. This marks that China has the first independent tariff code that is beneficial to the national economy and people's livelihood in more than 100 years.