European Lightweight Parcels vs. Russian Trade in Persia in the Early 20th Century

Abstract

The main issue the article considers is the transit of European goods through the territory of the Russian Empire to Persia in the form of lightweight postal parcels in the beginning of the 20th century. The main objectives of the research include defining the impact of existing practice on the Russian trade in Persia in conditions of high competition between Russian and foreign exporters; finding out how the government representatives and Russian entrepreneurs, sending goods to Middle-East market, saw the existing situation. The author showed that there were some disagreements on transit of European postal parcels to Persia between the government officials and Russian entrepreneurs. Starting from 1905, when the two states joined the international Washington Convention, the disagreements were the most obvious during the first years after the transit launch. Both sides regarded its impact on the Russian trade as negative. However, while government representatives related the situation to inactivity of the Russian merchant class, the latter pointed to existing drawbacks in the operation of transit system. By 1913, the Russian government acknowledged the necessity of limiting the flow of European parcels to Persia, but they did not make up their mind to stop the transit completely for restoring the monopoly of the Russian trade in the north of Persia.