1
373
HH
6
"It will thus be seen that out of the 12,000,000 taels odd, which I reckon the provincial authorities must collect as a minimum by way of land taxes, they return only 2,860,000 taels as actually received, leaving 9,000,000 odd in their hands some- where. A certain amount of this no doubt is legitimately required to carry on the work of the Government, for the provincial budget only provides for 1,678,000 taels-say, 224,0007--a sum which is manifestly inadequate to administer properly a province (almost a kingdom) of 60,000 square miles witli a population of some 22,000,000 inhabi- tants. Still, making every allowance, it is manifest there is frightful waste somewhere, and if one takes into account the revenues from other sources which are probably equally mismanaged and misappropriated, the waste and extravagance is beyond imagination. To mention only one of these sources-also derived from the Peking Syndicate's experience-land transfer fees. By law there is payable on affixing the official seal to a sale or mortgage of land a fee nominally of 3 but actually of about 8 per cent. ad calorem. The fees which the Syndicate were asked to pay came to over 10 cent.
per Assuming there are 150,000,000 mow of land in Honan of an average value of 10 tacls per mow which is well below the mark, and supposing that land on an average changes hands once in sixty years or two generations, one-sixtieth each year gives a value transferred of 25,000,000 taels; 8 per cent, on that should bring in an anuual yield of 2,000,000 taels. And yet the returns, as given in the above balance sheet, of miscellaneous taxes from all sources (of which land transfer fees must be one) are put down as only yielding 200,000 taels altogether.
"It may be noted here that the balance sheet above given is for 1900, and consequently before the Boxer indemnity payments began. The "foreign loans " for which the province then stood assessed at 390,000 taels were those contracted as the consequence of the Japanese War. The Boxer indemnities, which imposed an additional annual charge on the Government of China of some 22,000,000 táels, were met by calling on each of the provinces to provide a proportion varying with their means, and the amount allocated to the Province of Honan was 900,000 taels. The expedients by which the Governor proposed to raise this extra amount were described by him in memorials addressed to the Throne in 1903 as follows ---
-kin and transfer deeds..
Taels.
Increase on salt duty
400,000
200,000
54
ور
land tax by levying extra 300 cash per tael in districts where this had not previously been enforced, estimated to produce Aids to extra provincial troops retained
80,000
90,000
Economies on river embankments Sundry economies
80,000
50,000
Total
900,000
7
fair standard. There are many places, no doubt, poorer, but on the other hand there are unquestionably vast tracts of far greater productive capacity. It is not to be compared in point of fertility with the rice and silk producing plains of the lower Yang-tsze or of the Canton delta. The principal crop, I speak of the part traversed by the Peking Syndicate railway, is the tall millet or kaoliang, so common in North China, and there is the spring crop of wheat or barley which is equally common, but of rice, which is the crop par excellence of these Yang-tsze and southern districts, there is practically none. It is also inferior probably to many parts of Szechuan as also of Ilunan and Hupeh. In taking it, therefore, as a standard, we are probably well within the mark, and it would not seem to be going too far if we were to assume 20, or even 25 tael cents per mow as an all round average of existing land taxation. Abundant individual instances could be furnished showing rates much higher even than that.
"The conclusion of the whole matter is that China is very far from being in a bankrupt condition. There is an enormous reserve of wealth here that might be drawn upon for useful purposes, and which is now frittered away to no advantage. The money is not, of course, lost to the country, but it goes mainly to support unproductive labour, and future generations derive no benefit from it. An object lesson is now before the eyes of the Chinese Government if they could but see it. Among the items of expenditure figuring in the above balance sheet of the Honan Province for 1900, there is one of 50,000 taels, a contribution for building the northern railways. This one of a like amount contributed by the six northerly provinces for several years towards the building of the Tien-tsin-Shanhaikwan- Newchwang line. That railway has been earning lately, I am informed, a net profit of about 1,000,000 dollars (100,000Z) a-month. So that the modest contribution of 50,000 taels from Honan, which otherwise would have vanished like the rest, is now a permanent investment yielding perhaps 10 or 15 per cent. for all the time coming. And this is an income too not wrung from the cultivators of the soil, but willingly paid by merchants who are themselves all the wealthier by the transport facilities thus brought to their doors."
(Signed)
G. JAMIESON.
"We have no means of knowing to what extent the extra 300 cash per tael of original land tax was imposed or how far it was in vogue before, but we may remark that if it was a general increase, the yield from this item alone would be fully sufficient to meet the whole of the Boxer indemnity charge on the province.
Turning now from the Province of Honan and taking a survey of the whole Empire, let us see how the figures would work out.
In my revenue and expenditure Report, quoted at the head of this paper, I calculated there should be 650,000 square miles of cultivated land in China equivalent to (in round numbers) 100,000,000 English acres or, at 6 mow per acre, 2,400,000,000 mow. If the average which I consider good for Honan holds good generally for the Empire, the whole amount levied from the people as land tax would amount to 451,000,000 of taels. In the paper addressed by Sir Robert Hart to the Chinese Government (printed in "North China Herald" of the 15th April, 1904), recommending certain reforms in taxation, he calculated that the whole taxable land in China might amount to 4,000,000,000 of mow, which on the basis of 200 cash per mow, and taking a tael as equal to 2,000 cash, should yield a revenue of 400,000,000 taels. Sir Robert's estimate of the area under cultivation is greater than mine, but on the other band his proposed levy of 200 cash or 10 tael cents per mow is, I should consider, much under the average actually levied. The experience of the Syndicate's railway in Honan shows an average of 1,882 tacls, or nearly double the sum at which Sir Robert Hart puts it, so that if the present levy is only continued, there should be 400,000,000 forthcoming for Imperial purposes, and yet a very large sum left over for costs of administration and other provincial purposes.
"As a basis of calculation, the Province of Honan appears to me to form a very
F
0
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.