CHINA’S FINANCES

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 913, 5 March 1930, Page 9

CHINA’S FINANCES

FIRST BUDGET ISSUED NATIONAL ECONOMY SOUND SHANGHAI, Tuesday. The first Budget of any Government in China was issued today by Mr. T. V. Sung, Minister of Finance, at the third plenary conference of the Kuomintang (Nationalist Party). It was described as a report on the national receipts and expenditure in the 17th fiscal year of the Republic. • The Minister explained that the Budget did not represent the receipts and expenditure of the entire country, but offered a composite picture embracing various areas where national financial control has been effective in the past year. The statement was incomplete, but it gave the entire receipts and expenditure of the central Government, including regions under Government authority, but omitting areas where the Finance Ministry cannot administer the revenue. Mr. Sung proudly pointed to the fact that the Government was the first for 20 years which had been able to break the vicious circle of the cost of living. Foreign loans, he said, were secured by current revenues. He claimed that the basis of the national economy was sound and merely awaited peace in order to exhibit colossal strength and establish the country’s credit in the eyes of the world. The total receipts were about 434,500,000 dollars (roughly £43,450,000). The chief item of expenditure, excluding administrative expenses, was shown to be the cost of military campaigns, which had absorbed about 209,000,000 dollars (roughly £20,900,000).