25 Kilogram - Fine Grains Stamp Zhengzhou City, Henan

Chinese grain ration coupons operated as a parallel currency system from the 1950s through the mid-1990s, when the state controlled both production and distribution of staple commodities. This Zhengzhou municipal coupon was issued by the city-level grain bureau rather than the provincial authority — a distinction that mattered in practice, since municipal coupons were non-transferable outside the issuing administrative zone and could not be used to claim grain in a neighboring city, even within Henan Province itself.

The coupon's denomination in kilograms of fine grain (细粮) rather than coarse grain reflects the urban rationing hierarchy that persisted into the early 1990s. China formally abolished the national grain rationing system in 1993, making 1991 issues like this one among the final cohort before the whole apparatus was dismantled.