Directory_and_Chronicle_1931 — Page 1075

MENGTSZ AND YUNNANFU

自蒙 Mêng-tsa

This is a district city in south-east Yunnan, and together with Man-hao, a village on the left bank of the Red River, was opened to trade by the Additional Convention to the French Treaty of Tientsin of the 25th April, 1886, signed at Peking on the 26th June, 1887. The town is two days' journey from Man-hao and about six days' from the frontier of Tonkin at Laokay, and beautifully situated, being built on a cultivated plateau 20 miles long by about 12 miles in breadth, encircled by picturesque mountains, and is 4,280 feet above the level of the sea. It has a Chinese population of 38,562, but was a place of much more importance before the Mahommedan rebellion, as the numerous well-built temples, many of them now in ruins, still testify. It is, however, a considerable commercial emporium even now, and is becoming an important centre for the distribution of foreign goods imported via Tonkin. The French Consul hoisted his flag at Mêngtsz on the 30th April, 1889, and the Customs station was opened in the following August.

TRADE IN 1929

The expectation that, even should there be no increase in the volume of trade at Mengtsz, at least the standard of previous years would be maintained, was not fulfilled. The new Customs tariff and the cancellation of the special duty-reduction privileges formerly accorded to goods crossing the Sino-French frontier naturally caused importations to diminish. Apart from this, the main factor contributing to this decline was the financial chaos which prevailed in Yunnan, exchange during the year, varying between 470 and 920 Yunnan paper dollars for 100 piastres. With a view to reorganising the finance of the province, silver bars to a value of over Hk. Tls. 1,100,000 were imported from Tonkin and Hongkong, but as large quan- tities of blank bank-notes arrived from America and the local printing of bank- notes still continued unabated, public confidence was shaken, and these plans failed to materialise. It is impossible to state the amount of paper notes in circulation or the silver reserve on hand to guarantee these note issues. From a revenue point of view the year was one of the most interesting in the annals of the Mengtsz Customs, as the ten-year-old problem of collecting Customs duty on a sound basis was in a certain measure solved, and from the 1st November, 1929, the revenue collecting rate in the Mengtsz district was to some extent, at any rate, based on the principles adopted at other treaty ports. In view, however, of the losses suffered by merchants through financial difficulties, Customs duties and surtaxes are at present being levied at half the silver rate-i.e., Hk. Tls. 100 = Yunnan silver $234.502, or the equivalent in local currency. The intrinsic value of the Mengtsz Customs collection has thus increased and largely makes up for the apparent decrease in revenue when comparing the year's collection with previous years' totals, which were given in fictitious Haikwan taels. There was considerable military activity throughout the year, and in the early part of the sunmer pack-animals were commandeered wholesale, thus delaying caravans pro- ceeding to and from the interior. During the rainy season railway traffic suffered less than usual from landslides, and there was only one serious interruption, when a considerable portion of the railway was washed into the river and the transportation of passengers and cargo was stopped for 15 days. A decrease of 2 million taels in the value of foreign imports was mainly due to the fact that in previous years Chinese cotton goods, arriving in Yunnan after transhipment at Hongkong, lost their native status and were entered in the returns as being of foreign provenance. The amount of tin exported did not come up to expectations, the causes being local speculation in this metal and difficulties in finding workmen for the mines. It is surprising that other exports, on the whole, were fewer than in 1928, as the further depreciation of