500 Grams - Ripe Grains Stamp Jinzhou City, Liaoning

Grain ration coupons of this type were issued by municipal and county-level grain bureaus across China well into the early 1990s, long after urban food rationing had been quietly dismantled in most coastal cities. Jinzhou, an inland industrial hub in western Liaoning, retained its local coupon system as central price controls on grain were only formally lifted nationwide in 1993. This particular stamp — denominated in weight rather than currency — entitled the bearer to purchase milled grain at the subsidized state price, a figure often less than half the open-market rate by 1990.

The official seal functions as the sole authentication device, which made provincial coupons notoriously vulnerable to counterfeiting during the late reform period.