TSINGTAO (KIAOCHAU)
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A139
By the Sino-Japanese Treaty of 1915, China engaged herself to recognise all matters that might be agreed upon between the Japanese Government and the German Government respecting the disposition of all the rights, interests and concessions, which, in virtue of treaties or otherwise, Germany possessed vis-a-vis China in relation to the province of Shantung. This instrument was recognised at the time by Great Britain and France. At the Conference of the Allies at Paris, the Chinese delegates contended that any rights which Germany possessed should revert to their Government, in accordance with Japan's original undertaking, especially as, since that undertaking was given, China had become one of the Allies. As they failed to obtain satisfaction, they declined to sign the Peace Treaty with Germany, which provided that Germany's rights in Shantung should be transferred to Japan. The matter. came before the Washington Conference in 1921, and the result was the Shan- tung Treaty, under which it was provided that the territory should be restored to China. A Sino-Japanese Commission was subsequently appointed to give effect to the provisions of the Treaty, and this body met in 1922 and arranged terms which are set forth in the Treaty section of this volume.
While Kiaochau was in German occupation, the special attention of the Administration was devoted to agricultural, commercial and mining deve- lopment in the Protectorate and Shantung. The local administration con- sisted of a Council, composed of all the heads of the several administrative departments under the personal supervision of the Governor and four mem- bers chosen from the civil population and appointed for two years. The Pro- tectorate developed to an unlooked-for extent under this system of admini- stration, which enabled all the vital questions at issue, such as legal rights, landed properties, land-tax assessment, school and church matters, to be sat- isfactorily settled. The object of the Administration in dealing with the land question was to secure for every settler the lasting possession of his plot, thereby opposing unhealthy land speculation. Tsingtao, on the 2nd Septem- ber, 1898, was declared a free port. The harbour had all the advantages of a Treaty port, and as a free port especially recommended itself as an em- porium, since the merchant could there store, free of duty, his wares from abroad or his raw materials brought from the interior of China. The Chinese import duties were at first levied only on goods brought to Tsingtao by sea, when they were transported beyond the borders of the Protectorate into Chinese territory. The Chinese export duties were at first levied only on goods brought from the interior of China, when they were shipped, from the. German Protectorate to any other place. But in December 1905 a new Convention came into force whereby Tsingtao. ceased to be a free port,
and the Imperial Maritime Customs began to collect duties there as well as all
all the other Treaty ports of China. the Convention stipulated that 20 per cent of the import duty collected at Tsingtao should be paid to the Imperial German Government. The Com- missioner of Customs in his report for 1906 commented on the arrangement. as follows:-"The principal object of the arrangement, which, moreover, afforded the opportunity of a political rapprochement and material conces sions for mutual benefit on both sides, was the creation and promotion of trade and commerce between the Pachtgebiet and the Chinese hinterland. The results of the first epoch have conclusively proved the wisdom of this novel arrangement. Under it trade developed beyond expectation and rose. from a value of Taels 2,000,000 in 1899 to Tls. 22,000,000 in 1905, and Tsingtao,- the former dilapidated fishing village, grew into a handsome city with a flourishing mercantile community and a considerable number of manufactur- ing establishments, giving promise of good profits and further development. Its success emboldened the merchants, foreign and Chinese, to ask for, and the Government to agree to, going a step further and arranging for the limitation of the free area, which formerly comprised the whole Pachtgebiet, to the harbour, on much the same lines as the German free ports Hamburg and Bremen. The chief advantage of this step lies in the removal of Custom control from the railway stations to the free area, and the consequent free-
A16
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