½ Kilogram - Coarse Grain Stamp Ye County, Henan

Chinese county-level grain ration coupons from the reform period are among the most overlooked issued documents in Chinese fiscal history. Ye County, in southwestern Henan, operated its own grain bureau distribution network independently of provincial allocation — a bureaucratic remnant of the planned economy that persisted well into the late 1980s even as market liberalization was officially underway.

The coarse grain designation is the telling detail. By 1988, fine grain (wheat flour, polished rice) was increasingly available through market channels, but coarse grain coupons — covering sorghum, millet, maize — remained tightly rationed in inland Henan, where rural supply chains were slower to liberalize. This half-kilogram denomination implies household-level daily distribution rather than bulk institutional allocation.