To the Editor of the result of raising it Pass at all.
$m,—Although Mr. ES. Little's posal to increase the rate of Transit Duty per cent, wi ne the present of Import Duties, was rejected at the Association meeting of the proposal secured such a large fulles that it seems desirable to examine itin closely. and it must be confessed that the more one considers the dificult it is we F expected therefrom, whether to foreign trade, or the provincial revenues for which the Transit Duties are to be specially ear marked.
Mr. Little maintains that the tem of Inward Transit Passes "works on the whole very well;" as against this, those who have given. more consideration to the question than Mr. Little probably has, maintain th i S$ failure, the 1 likin officials, an hostility which is it. Little wants, that at present the "1 to Import Duty, do her fix "over all" on than 9} to 10 per cent; i that, what object can he hav transit Duty should coldle says nothing about the Transit a8 applied' to Exports; the export trade has no concern for him. Here are the figures value of Fo 1901... 169,657,757 Amount of Outward Dues collected The Export Dut 2.89 percent fon the value of the produce exported made effective through the medium of the therefore the Transit Dut 1.40 per likin barriers.
Astowhich view is right, cent, which if app ed to the whole of king of Inward Transit Passes j the orts woud produced Ts. during 191 be left to decide.
5,205; the actual Transit Daties collected show that not an eleventh part of \the Exports availed themselves of the Transit Pas. The system is, in fact, a dead failure except at Chinkiang where more than a quarter of the Transit Duties were collected, and at Shanghai where the collection was nearly 50 per cent of the whole (practically all on silk).
Tam, ete., 28rd April.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.